I have never felt passionately enough about any business to take the time to write an online review until now. I had taken my two dogs to Bethany for 5 years. Although I was never overly impressed with them (the place is dingy and rundown, often smells a bit of urine, cranky staff, long wait even though you have a scheduled apt, not warned by Dr. Wayland that my 13 lb dachshund could have a reaction to the amt of drugs given during an apt to cause him to limp and not be able to walk up and down stairs for 24 hours, infection after neutering, non-responsive to my calls when concerned about those things until 3 follow up phone calls) We felt as a family that our dogs were healthy and as long as we kept on top of the vet and cared for our dogs well on our own they would be fine and did not bother to find another vet. During hurricane Irene we noticed that our Corgi, Sadie was acting strangely - originally thought it was the storm and then noticed that she seemed to have trouble swallowing and it turned out that she had a small lump in her throat. We took her in for emergency care at another vet that was opened and were informed after many tests that our beloved 3 year old dog had cancer. All of her lymph nodes were swollen and she may have 6 - 8 weeks. I wanted our own vet to provide an opinion. Sadie had just been in for her yearly exam 4 months prior. The emergency care vet explained that our vet was not negligent - and that cancer can spread very rapidly. I was encouraged to think about euthanizing her because she would deteriorate quickly, and if chemo is not an option for us financially and steroids didn't work she would suffer a lot in the coming weeks. I waited anyway, and took Sadie to Bethany on Monday morning. I was informed by Judy in reception that the vets were there caring for two other dogs, but could not see Sadie because there was no power. I asked if they could at least visually examine her to and tell me if they agree that all of her lymph nodes were swollen, and was told sorry there is no power. Last time I checked you can look at a dog at 10 AM in a parking lot without power. I was told to take her back to the emergency care facility. Judy used my cell phone to speak with the receptionist at the emergency care vet in Cheshire and asked to be kept informed of Sadie's progress as well as all of the other animals that they were sending over there due to the power outage. Sadie was put down while I held her later that afternoon. In the coming days I received a sympathy card personally from the vet that had to put her down and a phone call from the staff inquiring about how we were doing and how our other dog (that they had never met before) was dealing with the stress of losing his friend. I double checked that Bethany Vet hospital was informed of what happened to Sadie and was told that they had. I never heard anything from them. I waited a few weeks and then called Bethany. Again I talked to Judy and told her I would like Bosco's records sent to another office because I was disgusted that no one bothered to check to see what happened to Sadie. She told me that there must be some mistake because Bosco was still listed as active in her computer. Well thanks Judy for being so insensitive that you would refer to a dog's life status as ACTIVE OR INACTIVE, but obviously Bosco is active in your system he is still alive. SADIE however is no longer ACTIVE, as she died in my arms 3 weeks ago. She offered to have Dr. Cary call me the next day as he was not in the office. I never got a phone call and don't expect to. We saw every vet in that place, every one of them was fine I guess, but in a time of real emergency they are complacent, insensitive and just plain mediocre. If you have taken the time to read this, you must be concerned about where to take your pets enough that I hope this encourages you to NOT GO HERE. If I could give zero stars I would read more
