Oakbrook Animal Hospital

Our family had been taking our pets to this vet for years without any issues, we absolutely loved and appreciated how compassionate they were when we had to put our St Bernard down due to bone cancer, HOWEVER, on December 22 we got a new puppy that had started vomiting on the way home, we assumed at first that he didn't travel well and was a little car sick. As the day progressed he started having diarrhea. By the next morning he had had 3 seizures, I contacted the office, they said to bring him right over. I fully expected a wait as we were not scheduled. They took us directly in, did a parvo test which came back negative. They did a glucose stick which was normal. All this before Dr. Garten came in to see the puppy. Once Dr. Garten came in, we showed him the video of one of the seizures, he called it a chewing gum seizure and said that the puppy more than likely had distemper which is typically fatal within a very short time and also highly contagious. I obviously had questions as to how do we know for sure and what other indications to such a diagnosis....he couldn't directly answer my questions, brought out his phone and appeared to be googling the answers, then went to get a very large book to look up info. Mind you, at this point he has not laid a finger on our puppy to examine him. I kept asking if this could be anything else and he was obviously getting very annoyed with me. He made a half hearted attempt to satisfy me by looking the pup over which he screamed in pain when Dr. Garten pressed on his belly. Dr. Garten admitted he felt something but basically insisted that the distemper will be fatal anyway so if there is anything in his belly it would not matter. He tried to push us to put the puppy down. I asked him to do an echo to check as he had previosly said that would be how to know for sure. He then snapped at me stating they don't have an echo they would have to do an xray and that we would be contaminating his equipment and his techs would have to change their clothes. I politely said ok, do the xray after I spoke with my husband via phone. The xray was done and confirmed that he did have a foreign object in his stomach. I asked what needed to be done. He stated that he would need surgery but that he wouldn't do it due to a back issue and that the other Dr was unavailable, then proceeded to again get rude with me stating he had other patients to see that were actually on the schedule. NEVER did I ask them to dedicate their time solely to my pup, I fully expected to wait while they attended to others. One of the techs was very helpful and made a few calls to see if Paola Vet Clinic could take care of our pup. We went to Paola Vet Clinic and they did a blood draw and found that his sodium levels were so low that it was the cause of the seizures. They gave his some fluids and barium and our pup was able to pass the foreign body without surgery. Dr. Garten wanted to kill an otherwise healthy puppy who had just eaten something he shouldn't have. I'm sure he was having a busy hectic day as it was right at the holiday's, but that does not excuse his blatant disregard for our pup's life. Read Less