24/7 emergency care hospital for animals opens in town

TOOWOOMBA is now home to a 24/7 emergency care animal hospital, a vital service that had been missing from the Garden City.

TOOWOOMBA is now home to a 24/7 emergency care animal hospital, a vital service that had been missing from the Garden City.

REDvets is now in operation as part of the Toowoomba Family Vet clinic, which opened in 2017 in the former Weis building.

REDvets is a separate branch to the original clinic, and doesn't undertake any day-to-day veterinary services.

It offers gold standard emergency and critical care with the assistance of Veterinary Specialists Services, a well-known clinic in Brisbane and the Gold Coast, which will help provide specialist surgery.

A new state-of-the-art Siemens CT scanner has also been installed which enables the vets to manage both emergency and surgical cases.

Dr Dave Hall. Picture: Nev Madsen

Owner Dave Hall said the service was ideal for Toowoomba pet owners, as they no longer had to travel down the range to get the best health care for their furry family members.

He said the doors to REDvets never closed, and staff worked nights as opposed to being on-call.

"REDvets will be able to transfer owners and animals back to their primary care vets after they have come to see us for an emergency after hours or on weekends," he said.

"We want to work with other vets in Toowoomba, not in competition, as we appreciate how hard it can be ask vets to be on call after working all day."

Practice manager Rian Roux said opening the REDvets was a "dream come true" for the team.

Rian Roux and Phoebe Stephens. Picture: Nev Madsen

"Dave is very passionate about critical care and the emergency element of vet medicine," he said.

"One of things we know about the community and their pets, and we have animals ourselves, is that they are a really close part of our family.

"When something happens in the middle of the night or if there is a snake bite, tick, or something severe that is life-threatening it's great to be able to get on the phone and come straight down at any hour of the night.

"It's really rewarding for our team to be in those moments with our clients and their animals.

"We want to look after them with the best technology, best efforts and give them everything we've got to try and make them healthy and happy for as long as we can."

For more information phone 1300 00 VETS or go to www.redvets.com.au.
 

Originally published as 24/7 emergency care hospital for animals opens in town