Information for Pet Owners
Stansted Veterinary Specialists is a small animal referral centre in Essex whose mission is to deliver compassionate care to both people and pets.
We work with vets all over England to provide diagnostic investigations and advanced treatments whenever the required expertise or specialist facilities are not available in their immediate setting.
Just as you may to be referred from your local GP to see a consultant in an NHS Trust Hospital, we are available to work alongside you and your vet whenever your pet requires more specialist attention.
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We are not a replacement for your regular vet and we do not see pets unless they have been referred to us directly.
We encourage you to discuss referral with your local veterinary team if you think your pet could benefit from specialist care, as they will be able to guide you through the referral process and advise on the suitability of referral in your specific circumstances.
We are here to help and look forward to meeting both you and your pet.
What happens when you are referred?
Once a referral has been made, our team will be in touch with you to arrange an appointment. At this time, we will also request further information from your local vet, including a referral letter, your pet's medical history, and any imaging studies or laboratory tests that have already been performed. This allows us to be fully informed of your pet's clinical history prior to your first consultation with the specialist team.
Prior to your appointment
We appreciate that it can be daunting when your pet is referred for specialist assessment. We want to put your mind at ease during this worrying time and are available to answer any questions you have regarding the process ahead of your visit. Please do not hesitate to contact us for support via email (info@svs.vet) or phone (+44 (0) 1279 359 999).
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Before attending your appointment, we will send you a form to complete that enables us to understand the individual needs of your pet. This will request information about their behaviour, regular diet, and any other aspects of their daily routine that you think are important for us to know. We want to ensure your pet is settled and content at the clinic should an overnight stay be needed, and knowing about small details like their toileting habits, voice commands, or bedtime routine can make a big difference.
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Where possible we ask you to email any relevant documentation (such as insurance documents or travel certification) at least 24 hours prior to your appointment.
Attending your appointment
In most cases, we will ask you not to feed your pet after 10pm on the evening prior to their appointment. Recent feeding could interfere with diagnostic tests we need to perform or could delay procedures that require sedation or anaesthesia. There are occasions when fasting prior to an appointment is not recommend (including diabetic patients or especially young patients). Please do get in touch if you are unsure whether or not withholding food prior to your appointment is advisable. Water should still be made available to your pet until the time of their appointment.
If you pet has been receiving any medication, this should be given as normal on the day of your appointment, unless you have been advised otherwise.
When you arrive at Stansted Veterinary Specialists, you will be checked in at reception, where our staff will confirm that your details are correct or request other essential information.
When it is time, one of our vets or nurses will introduce themselves and bring you and your pet into a consultation room. The length of this appointment can vary from 15 minutes to an hour, depending on the nature of your visit. During this time, you will have the opportunity to relay any concerns that you have about your pet and discuss a plan for the next steps with our clinical team.
Following your consultation, it may be that you take your pet home with you or alternatively they could be admitted to the clinic for further tests or treatment.
During hospitalisation
We really do take a team approach at Stansted Veterinary Specialists. Whilst hospitalised with us, your pet will be cared for by our team of Specialist Veterinary Surgeons, alongside our experienced Registered Veterinary Nurses and other essential support staff.
Members of the clinical team (including at least one veterinary surgeon and a veterinary nurses) are on site 24 hours a day to provide the best level of round-the-clock care to your pet.
To maintain our high standards of hygiene, we provide all bedding for your pet whilst hospitalised and ask that you do not to bring any bedding from home. On the rare occasion where bedding or toys are permitted, it is unfortunately not possible for us to guarantee their safe return to you. We have a good range of bedding and toys available at the practice to provide comfort and environmental enrichment for your pet throughout their stay.
We have a wide range of food options in stock for both cats and dogs that will satisfy most palates. For patients with specific dietary requirements, or where a more prolonged hospitalisation is planned, we may however ask you to bring some food from home to avoid any disruption to their normal dietary routine. The exception to this rule is if you are feeding a raw diet at home. We cannot store or feed raw diets in the practice as some of our hospitalised patients may have a weakened immune system and be at greater risk of infection.
We do appreciate that if a patient is staying in the hospital for more than a couple of days you may wish to visit them. This can be a positive experience for some patients - but unfortunately we also find that some pets become upset after their owner leaves and this can be inadvertently unsettling for them. We therefore ask you to consider this and how you think your pet may react when deciding whether or not to visit. We do not have set visiting hours, but if you would like to visit your pet this can be arranged within working hours at a time convenient to both you and the clinical team.
Aftercare from SVS
At a time we feel your pet is ready to go home, we will arrange a discharge appointment with a member of their clinical team. Here we will provide full discharge instructions (including written instructions) which may contain information regarding future feeding, prescribed medications, exercise regimes, or wound care.
You remain very welcome to call us at any time should further questions or concerns arise, even after your pet has returned home to you.
There are many conditions for which follow-up assessments will be recommended at Stansted Veterinary Specialists, and these will be discussed at the time of discharge. We will also write a full referral report to your local veterinary surgeon, providing them with information regarding the diagnostic tests we have performed, the treatment plan for your pet, and any follow-up recommendations. If follow-up care with your regular vet is considered more appropriate, we will work closely with them to support your pet’s ongoing care.
