Talking with pet owners about anesthesia can be challenging for many veterinary professionals. Pet owners hear “anesthesia” and often picture the worst-case scenario. By ensuring anesthetic safety and helping clients understand the real risks and the steps you take to mitigate them, you can help alleviate their fears.
Key Takeaways
- Start conversations with empathy to calm clients’ emotional fears about anesthesia.
- Demystify the anesthetic process by walking clients through it step by step.
- Be honest with clients about anesthetic risks, which are minimal in most cases, and what steps you’ll take to minimize them.
- Emphasize the safety protocols and training that guide every anesthetic procedure.
- Talk about the benefits of surgery, including comfort, health, and quality of life, to help clients better understand the procedure’s risks and rewards.
Veterinary anesthesia is critical in pet healthcare, from routine procedures to emergency surgeries. Modern, safe anesthetic protocols allow pets to undergo cutting-edge treatments without pain or stress, improving their quality of life. Addressing anesthesia concerns using client communication techniques that focus on the benefits of anesthesia builds trust and can improve compliance to ensure pets get the care they need.
1. Start with empathy
Anesthetic deaths are rare in veterinary medicine, but telling clients that does little to alleviate their fears. Pet owners react to the idea of anesthesia with feelings and emotions rather than logic. To move past those feelings, clients need to feel heard.
Start by acknowledging their fear. Try something like, “It’s normal to feel nervous about anesthesia. A lot of pet owners feel the same way.” This validation opens the door to an honest, compassionate conversation, and simply addressing their concern can make it less intrusive. Then, you can shift the conversation toward client education and reassurance.
2. Explain what happens during veterinary anesthesia
Most pet owners are unaware of what anesthesia involves, leaving them to picture the worst. Walking them through the process helps them understand what happens behind the scenes and how hard your team works to keep pets safe.
Discuss the details from start to finish, including:
- Pre-anesthetic workup process and purpose
- Planning and drug selection based on individual anesthetic risks
- IV catheter and endotracheal tube placement
- Pain control
- Monitoring protocols
- Procedure details
- Team member qualifications
3. Be transparent about the risks
Veterinary anesthesia isn’t risk-free, but it is considerably lower-risk than most clients believe. Being upfront about anesthetic risks and emphasizing your mitigation strategies builds credibility with pet owners. Veterinary anesthesia-related deaths in healthy pets occur in less than 0.05% of dogs and less than 0.1% of cats, but most clients feel it’s much higher. Explaining how modern anesthetic protocols pose extremely low risks is a good place to start.
Next, explain the risks as they pertain to each patient, discussing how underlying conditions—not age alone—impact risks, and what you’ll do to address them (e.g., adjusting drug protocols or postponing the procedure). Avoid dismissing concerns about risk with a blanket, “don’t worry.” Instead, say, “Here’s what we’ll do to keep your pet safe.”
4. Address specific myths or fears
Pet owners may have particular concerns based on previous experiences, internet horror stories, or outdated information. Here are some ways to address a few of the most common beliefs and fears.
Concern: “My pet is too old for anesthesia.”
Geriatric pets can safely undergo anesthesia with pre-screening, safe drug selection, dose adjustments, and monitoring. The entire patient is evaluated, not only their age.
Concern: “What if my pet doesn’t wake up?”
Fewer than 1 in 100 pets die under anesthesia, and patients are thoroughly screened to ensure each pet is a good candidate for safe anesthesia.
Concern: “Does my pet’s health condition make anesthesia unsafe?”
Anesthetic procedures are recommended for pets when the benefits outweigh the risks, which are carefully considered for each patient. In most cases, pets with chronic diseases or multiple health conditions can safely undergo anesthesia as long as the appropriate tests are performed beforehand and the protocol is adjusted to meet their body’s specific needs.
5. Highlight safety and team training
Clients are often surprised to learn the extensive safety measures veterinary anesthesia teams use to keep pets safe, which closely mimic those used in human medicine. Use this opportunity to educate clients and highlight your team’s skills and training. Offering to show clients the surgery suite and monitoring equipment can also provide reassurance.
Discuss monitoring equipment and what each instrument measures, using lay terms, and talk about the education and training your team undergoes to stay up-to-date on the latest medical advances. Reassure pet owners that a credentialed veterinary technician will be with your pet from start to finish, advocating for their comfort and ensuring their safety.
6. Focus on the positives
When clients ask whether anesthesia or surgery is necessary for their pet, they may think about the risks while ignoring the possible benefits. Shift the conversation to focus on outcomes and quality of life instead. Is their pet experiencing pain that a procedure could resolve? Will it extend the pet’s healthy lifespan?
This strategy is especially helpful for dental procedures, where clients tend to extrapolate their own experiences. Highlighting the fact that anesthesia eliminates stress and pain while ensuring patient and team safety can help them understand the benefits for their pet.
Anesthesia doesn’t have to be scary
Veterinary anesthesia can strike fear in pet owners, but you can help alleviate their concerns. Client communication that emphasizes empathy, education, and transparency can help clients move from fear to understanding and make informed decisions about their pet’s care.
Parnell produces safe, effective medications for use in veterinary anesthesia. Learn more about Parnell's products, or check out the RACE-approved course, Foundations of Anesthesia & Sedation, to help team members build confidence and knowledge in veterinary anesthesia.
