How the corporatization of vet clinics is driving up prices across the

Editor’s note: This story is part of a joint investigation with the Fifth Estate, Marketplace, and Radio-Canada’s Enquête and La Facture looking at the changing pet health sector in Canada.

When Maja Terzic brought her sick cat to the vet, she agreed to a few hundred dollars in blood work to hopefully find out what was wrong with him. Guppy was then whisked away to a back room.

“I was just kind of in the dark, I didn’t know what was happening,” Terzic said. 

An hour later, she was handed a $1,100 bill, full of tests and treatments she says she never agreed to.

“My stomach literally dropped. I was like, ‘OK, I’m going to do the credit card not the debit card today,” said Terzic, who had no idea the clinic was owned by the largest veterinary consolidator in Canada, VetStrategy. 

Terzic’s experience mirrors that of a rising number of pet owners who say they’ve seen a dramatic increase in their veterinary bills in the past few years — a trend that’s arisen alongside the practice of multinational corporations quietly buying up independent vet clinics across the country.

Before 2010, almost all veterinary clinics in Canada were owned by the vet you visited. Today, more than half of emergency and specialty hospitals and more than 20 per cent of all clinics are owned by six corporations.

The three biggest players in Canadian pet care are VetStrategy, VCA Canada and NVA Canada; between them, they own more than 600 clinics. The three companies are owned and operated by international conglomerates.

Hidden camera investigation

To see what type of care would be recommended and how much it would cost at corporate-run clinics, CBC’s Marketplace scheduled appointments at six different clinics across Toronto, all of them owned by VCA or VetStrategy. The majority of complaints Marketplace received were about the two chains.

Following consultations from veterinarians on how to design the spot check, Marketplace took Stella, a healthy four-year-old female Labrador retriever, to each clinic and described symptoms that suggested a possible urinary tract infection.

All of the veterinarians who saw Stella agreed, based on the description provided, that it seemed like the dog had a urinary tract infection. However, the treatment plans and the cost of the recommended care varied.

When it came to pricing, all of the clinics’ exam fees were within a similar range: $127 to $142 before tax. 

But the prices for the diagnostic test, called a urinalysis, varied considerably — the lowest at $47 and the highest coming in at $175. 

WATCH | Can you tell if your vet clinic is owned by a corporation?

Dr. Ivan Zak, a Moncton-based veterinarian, says this is an…