Can Pet Owners Get a Veterinary Appointment? What a Secret Shopper Study Revealed

Worried pet parent meets phone tree is a stress spiral no one needs—so we put it to the test. We sat down with health services researcher Dr. Simon Haeder to unpack a large secret shopper study that mimicked real owners calling nearby clinics to book first-visit puppy care. Across six diverse states, the results upend common assumptions: two-thirds of callers landed an appointment, average waits hovered around six days, and typical drives were about 13 minutes. Even better, directory inaccuracies were rare.

But averages aren’t the whole story. A meaningful slice of callers never reached a human or bailed after long holds, and rural clients paid a bigger time tax with longer waits and drives. We zero in on the most fixable barriers—phones and scheduling—and outline practical steps clinics can take right now: enable online booking for routine visits, add an answering service or AI-assisted intake to capture messages reliably, and set clear callback expectations. These low-friction changes reduce abandonment, calm anxious owners, and free front-desk teams to focus on in-clinic care.

We also zoom out to the big questions shaping veterinary access. How different are wait times for dentistry, oncology, and other specialties, especially outside metro hubs and away from teaching hospitals? What happens as pet insurance grows? And how do cats, horses, and rural communities fit into an access map still being drawn? You’ll come away with data you can use, a checklist to improve client communication, and smart planning tips if you’re welcoming a new pet.

If this conversation helps you see veterinary access more clearly, subscribe, share with a fellow pet lover, and leave a quick review so others can find the show.

JAVMA article: https://doi.org/10.2460/javma.25.05.0311

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Transcript

Cold Open & Sponsor Message

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Lisa Fortier 0:35

Welcome to Veterinary Vertex, the ADMA Journal's podcast where we delve into behind-the-scene looks with manuscript authors. I'm editor-in-chief Lisa Fortier, joined by associate editor Sarah Wright. Today we're discussing how barriers to care might impact animal and human welfare and the professional experiences of veterinarians with repeat guest Simon Hayter. Simon, thanks so much for joining us here again today.

Sarah Wright 1:00

Yeah, thanks for joining us, Simon.

SPEAKER_03 1:02

Thanks for having me.

Sarah Wright 1:03

So, Simon, can you start by summarizing the purpose of the study for our listeners?

SPEAKER_03 1:08

Yeah, so as we know from my last conversation with you guys, um, not a veterinarian and not even close, uh, but I'm a health and healthcare services researcher. And so I know a lot about you know the human side of healthcare. And um, pet owner, love our dog, uh, who recently unfortunately passed away, uh, but very interested in veterinary care and animals, especially dogs. Uh, and so I I dabble in the literature and I learn a lot and I notice a lot of gaps, you know, that we have kind of started to close on the human side that we haven't really addressed in the veterinary side. And so one of the things that I I thought hadn't been really addressed well was, you know, when people need care for their pets, can they get it? And so that's kind of where we ended up with this study.

Lisa Fortier 1:49

Simon, for those unfamiliar with what a secret shopper survey is, why use this and what is the approach useful in veterinary medicine?

SPEAKER_03 1:56

Yeah, I'm obviously biased because I've done these a lot on the human side. Uh, but I think they're really, really helpful. You know, um, we we try to learn about people's experiences, and and there's many ways to do this. One is just you know, use a standard survey, uh, but then people have to recall things and they might forget things and all those kind of things. And so a secret shopper survey is basically you know trying to uh get more reliable data. So you kind of mimic the experience of patients or consumers or you know, all kinds of things they've used, been used in many different fields. But basically, you try to, in our case, mimic what a veterinary patient would experience trying to get care and, you know, collect data and then learn something about you know the general you know situation of how people access care.

Call Script And Study Design

Sarah Wright 2:38

Yeah, super interesting. And what scenario did the callers use when requesting an appointment?

Choosing Diverse States

SPEAKER_03 2:43

Yeah, so we we mimic kind of you know the approach that we've used and extent used extensively on the on the human side. We looked at six states, uh, you know, that we've you've done on the human side before California, Washington, Pennsylvania, Ohio, Texas, uh, Minnesota. Uh we, you know, generated basically uh a profile for a patient. You know, we had like a slack of uh real but realistic home addresses. Um, we had names, dog names, gender, and all those kind of things, randomly assigned them to our callers. Uh, our callers then you know put in the home address into Google search, look for the closest veterinarian to their home address, put all that information into our data into our data system, then called the veterinarian and tried to get an appointment. You know, we had a kind of common script, I think that made a lot of sense. You got a new puppy, your new puppy needs to establish care somewhere, you need to get the first set of shots. And so that's, you know, we had that script. Uh, and then we collected all the data and we did this, you know, for more than 5,000 patients.

Lisa Fortier 3:41

Simon, why were those six states chosen on the human and then also on the veterinary side?

SPEAKER_03 3:47

Yeah, that's a good question. So, and in the most perfect world, we do every state and we collect enough data in every state, and then we get a truly representative picture of the country. It's often not possible, right? This is very expensive. You have to hire people, you have to train people, you know, this is like costs a lot of money. And so what we did is we kind of looked at states that are diverse in in many different ways, diverse geographically. You can think of California as the big cities, the rural areas, the mountains. Uh, we have different states that are very different politically, because that might matter too in many ways today when we think about healthcare, Texas, California, you know, those kind of things, different ruralities, different regulatory environments. And so we picked something that's kind of really, really diverse across those dimensions. And we think that gives us an appropriate, uh relative appropriate look at what the situation looks like across the country. Of course, we can't know quite for sure, but you know, we we had a lot of calls, we had a lot of different states across the entirety of the states. And so we're pretty confident in the findings that came out of this.

Lisa Fortier 4:44

And in this specific study, what outcomes were you primarily interested in?

SPEAKER_03 4:48

Yeah, again, we we kind of look to the human side. The most important one when you look for care is always can you get an appointment? Uh, you know, that's that's a starting point. And then, you know, if you can't get an appointment, why can't you get an appointment? So we looked at the reasons for failures. On the human side, you know, issues with provider directory play play pretty prominent roles. So, like people listed incorrectly, the phone number, it's wrong, it's the wrong specialty, all those, it's not in your network, you know, those kind of things. So we looked at those. Uh, and then we looked at, you know, when you get an appointment, how long do you have to wait for an appointment? That's a really meaningful measure for a lot of people. Like, is it a week, two weeks, those kind of things. And then lastly, we looked at how long do you have to drive? As you may remember from just a second ago, we have real home addresses and we have the addresses of the veterinary practices. So we can add an important dimension because you might be able to get care with someone in two days, but it's 50 miles away. And so that might be a big barrier for people as well.

Sarah Wright 5:36

And what did you find about overall appointment availability?

Barriers: Phones And Holds

SPEAKER_03 5:39

As I said, I come from the human side of medical care. Uh, shockingly good, I think, is the answer. And I think that's something that maybe surprised me a little bit because a lot of talk about, you know, undersupply of veterinarians and access challenges. And I think this is where the study comes in. But you know, two out of three calls actually got to an appointment. I think that's like unheard of on the human side, like unbelievably good. Like I'm still marveling as you know, I do a lot of human studies at the same time right now. And I go back to the veterinarian is like unbelievably good. Very few inaccuracies listed. So the phone numbers are generally correct, just uh, you know, single-digit errors there, uh, a little bit of issues with the capacity, but even in the single digits here as well. Uh, so that's that's something that's really, really good. I think the the thing that that raised a little bit of concern, uh, but again, it's still better than the human side is uh you had 15% of callers who couldn't connect to anyone. So they either ended up with an answering machine or some computerized system or busy line and those kind of things. Uh, or for some another 8%, uh, they were just put on hold for too long. You know, uh, we we kind of use the standard measure if you unhold for five minutes, kind of move, move on, or like we marked this as a inability to access, which is pretty standard, and I think what most people would do too. Uh, and so I think overall, pretty, pretty great, great data on on the accessibility. Wait times are really good too. Uh, you know, on the human side, we're saying wait times that are in the the 50 to 100 day range for dermatology, for example. Uh, and our end, you know, you could get uh an average, an appointment within six days in states like Texas was even three days or two days. So quite amazing. Travel time was pretty good too. Uh, you know, three 13 minutes, I think, was about the average. And again, across these numbers, we get some differences across the states. Uh uh, that's quite obvious, but also across rurality. And I think that's one of the big drivers where the differences come in.

Lisa Fortier 7:27

If we're doing so well, what were the most common barriers encountered for that other one out of three that couldn't get an appointment?

SPEAKER_03 7:33

Yeah, it's kind of, you know, the things that I just talked about, I think just not getting an answer from the veterinary office. I think that's that's where you know some of the hooks are for potential solutions to this. Like, how can we make sure that if I call a veterinary office, I actually reach someone and I can get an answer whether I can get in or not? I think that's really important for patients. They might be really concerned about that dog or that dog, you know, ate something they shouldn't have, and you're like nervous already, and then you're on hold for five minutes. That you know, puts people through the roof and makes them really anxious, or you can't get anyone, and then you call the next one and potentially can't get anyone there. And so you get really, really anxious, you know, those kind of things. But again, much better than human side. A couple of capacity issues. I'm looking at the numbers now. Only 4% didn't have new appointments or weren't new, taking new patients. That's a really, really good number uh again compared to human side. 2% inaccuracies, that's like, you know, on the human side, sometimes we have like 40, 50% inaccuracy. So it's quite quite amazing.

Practical Fixes For Practices

Lisa Fortier 8:27

Sounds pretty solvable, right? Answer the phone or get back to the messages.

Rural Gaps And Long Drives

SPEAKER_03 8:32

Yeah, I agree. No, if we want to talk policy solutions, like A, make it easier for people to schedule by offering like an online option. I think people really like this because then yeah, pick what's on their calendar, they don't have to wait. You know, it takes barriers off for your for your practice as well. Use an answering service or you know, make sure that you know you have front desk, which might be a challenge for a lot of practices that are, you know, particularly rural, I'm guessing. And you're like, maybe don't have a staffer there full time, and so you rely on the answering machine. So, you know, finding those, those are like solvable problems, though, I think, and and and and that you know create reduces a lot of the limited barriers.

Lisa Fortier 9:05

Yeah, it's a different uh population now, right? With the immediate gratification, people don't want to leave a message and trust that somebody's gonna get back to them. So we're so used to online booking and QR codes and all those things. So we need to meet the clients where they are.

SPEAKER_03 9:22

I think that's exactly true. You know, it's like the same with our kids. Like if they they have to watch a commercial or something, you know, on TV, they just get totally frustrated. And I think it's it's something we create um just a general expectation that I I want something and I want it now. And so, you know, the barriers. But you know, again, you know, if you if you're very worried about your your dog and you might be sick or hit hurt and you're trying to get in, you know, that's that's a separate situation. But in most cases, you know, I think that's that's probably why I know you have cases.

Sarah Wright 9:50

Were there any notable differences between rural and non-rural areas?

Comparing To Human Healthcare

SPEAKER_03 9:55

Yeah, I think that's kind of what stood out, and it's kind of you know, coming again from the human side, not unexpected. The the rural patients just do a little bit worse in in any regard. So they have a little bit harder time getting an appointment. They have to wait a little bit longer. Where the really comes in then is the driving time. It's about, you know, additional 15, 16, 17 minutes of driving on average. Um, what that, you know, these are average numbers. What that doesn't speak to obviously is many of the outliers on the data set, you know, the the above the 90th percentile, those are probably people that live in rural areas. And so that might be, well, the average is pretty good. I think this is a general takeaway from the study, the average is pretty good. We have outliers like 10%, the 5%, where the travel time might be 50 minutes or 100 minutes or or more, or it might be the wait times is 40 or 50 or 60 days. You know, those are the outliers. So those are hard problems to solve. And so, well, the the overall numbers, I guess, is a general takeaway, you know, kind of speaking ahead of where we want to go. It's the general access is good, but we have some outliers and it's hard to address those outliers, but we should obviously try to find some solutions for those.

Lisa Fortier 11:04

Yeah, I grew up in rural North Dakota, and you think nothing of getting in the car and driving 45 minutes just to get a vaccine for your horse or some medication. Like that's just what you get for growing up in a rural area. It's an expectation.

SPEAKER_03 11:16

Yeah, I know what you're talking about. My wife's from the mountains, high mountains of California. So like everything is two or three hour drive. You know, you get used to it. Uh, it gets problematic, obviously, when you have an emergency with your dog or when you don't have the resources to necessarily travel and those other kinds of things we need to start thinking about.

Lisa Fortier 11:33

What were some of the other findings that surprised you, especially sort of relative to human health care?

Tech, Automation, And Front Desk

SPEAKER_03 11:39

Yeah, as I said, you know, like I've I've run, I don't know, 300,000, 400,000 calls on the human side as a comparator. Um, the numbers are really bad on the human side. The inaccuracies are really bad, the wait times are really bad, the travel times tend to be really bad, the frustrations are just so much greater on the on the human side. And that obviously has something to do with, you know, on the human side, we have managed care arrangements. You have to go through your provider network. The provider network is presented to you by your carrier, you know, there's lots of issues with this. You don't really have that on the on the on the pet side yet. Although we have more and more insurance companies coming in, although it's more of the indemnity type insurance where you pick and then get reimbursed. But it wouldn't be surprising to me, you know, with the what we see on that side with the growing, growing, growing costs, you know, insurance companies getting out of market because the costs are too high. If we start seeing managed care arrangements on the on the veterin as well, where you have to go to a subset of providers, and that subset has to be presented to you by the carrier. And then you have to like make sure that they update it and that the numbers are correct. And then, you know, we will have to kind of see where the frustrations creep in. But I think uh again, compared to the human side, so much better. Um, and it's you know delightful in any ways.

Sarah Wright 12:52

So, Simon, how can veterinary practices use this information to improve client access and communication?

Specialty Care And Future Questions

SPEAKER_03 12:59

Yeah, I we we alluded to a little bit. I think just making sure that if someone wants to contact you, they can. And I think, you know, automate there's a lot of financial pressures on all kinds of veterinary practices. I think that's pretty well established. If you can automate some of these things, and I think we're getting there from a technology standpoint where, you know, you can have like an AI kind of front desk kind of person that handles even phone calls for you at this point, or you add the online option for scheduling. These are things where there might be a little bit of upfront cost, but I think they take a lot of hassle away and they bring in a happier patient that, you know, isn't frustrated, comes to you, you know, easy to schedule, comes already more positive, you know, with a positive mindset to you. And then the interactions about all the things that, you know, happen in the veterinary office that are often very challenging and you have to talk about costs and all those other things. But you start off with a better point where people are not frustrated. They already called five practices and got turned down because they couldn't reach anyone or there's no compassion, you know, those kind of things. So I think I think the takeaway point is that, you know, there's solutions here, the solutions are growing and they're getting cheaper uh to avoid the small issues that we ran into. From the rural side, I think, you know, that's that's a much harder policy situation to address, just like in the human side. Um, you know, harder to get people to work in rural places. Well, what can we do about those? Travel times are longer. What can we do about those? No, the caveat of everything we're talking about is obviously that we talked about preventive care. My guess is, and you know, hopefully we can work on this down the line, is specialty care might be a totally different picture. You know, what if you need dental care for your dog? What if you, you know, cancer care for your dog? And how does that look in terms of wait times, accessibility, and then especially what are the differences between more urban areas where, you know, maybe you have a veterinary, you know, school that has all kinds of clinics and you know, uh uh veterinees and all that kind of stuff where it's relatively easy to get in, or you live in rural north North Dakota or South Dakota or California and you, you know, struggle with those kind of things. So I think there's, you know, lots of opportunities to go go and explore this more.

Lisa Fortier 15:06

And on the flip side of that, Simon, you just talked how veterinary practice could improve that. What should pet owners keep in mind and what are their expectations should be met when they're seeking preventative care for a new pet?

SPEAKER_03 15:18

Yeah, so I think the big takeaways is like generally it's good, but it might not be good in your area, right? So I think planning ahead is is really important. I think, you know, especially our scenario is focused on a new dog. Figure out who's going to be your veterinarian before you get a new dog, or or do it right when you get it, right? I think, you know, this planning ahead is I think really, really crucial because you have to find someone that works for you, like from an access standpoint, opening hours, driving distance, and all that kind of stuff. But it also, you know, obviously something we didn't focus on is the cost of care may vary significantly across veterinary practices as well. It's changing dramatically all the time, you know. And you know, you guys talk about this, I'm sure, as well. Private equity coming in, taking over practices, and then the fee schedule changes overnight. You know, so you have to like think ahead of these kind of things. I think that that's something that, you know, no new pet owners or or pet owners moving to new areas kind of have to think about because you don't want to be in a position where I need a veterinarian today and I haven't even looked at who's close to my house and when they're open and whether they can take anyone and all those kind of things. So like planning ahead, I think is crucial in this in this regard.

Lisa Fortier 16:24

That's a really great point. You wouldn't, you hopefully wouldn't do that when you're having a new child or moving to a new area, you'd find a primary GP. So that I like that's a great take-home.

Sarah Wright 16:33

Yeah, I always tell my friends whenever they get a new pet, I say, get pet insurance and then find a veterinarian. Those are my two like first step things you need to do before anything else.

Research Next Steps

SPEAKER_03 16:43

Yeah, I think the pet insurance is something that we know a little bit about, but there's so much to learn as well. But you you guys know this the cost of veterinary care, just like the cost of medical care is starting to explode because there's more treatments and more advanced treatments, and we can do so much more for pets than we could just five or 10 years ago. But it all comes as a cost. And so you have to like kind of think ahead, you know, how what can I afford? What ethical responsibility do I have to my pet when it gets sick? And how do I manage those kind of things? So like being prepared and kind of thinking ahead in terms of A, having a veterinarian that you can get to, and B, having you know the financial protections is really, really crucial.

Sarah Wright 17:22

So, Simon, what are the next research questions that should be explored in this area?

Closing And Where To Read

SPEAKER_03 17:26

Uh, that's a good question. So we alluded to it again a little bit. Specially care, I think, might be a whole different uh uh experience. I've always been lucky as you know, I'm a professor, and I've basically always been to places that had a veterinary school. So getting in is is usually pretty simple. You know, at Wisconsin where I got my PhD, they have like a cancer hospital and you know, like all the things, dental clinic. So it's it's it's pretty pretty easy. But uh, you know, that I think might be different. But again, we don't know enough. I think this is a general you know, call for we know a lot on the veterin, like what works and you know, treatments, that kind of stuff, but like the environment of care that we've explored on the human side for I don't know, 100 years now, we haven't really pushed on on in the veterinary side. Like, what does it mean to have access to care? How well how long does it take? How does it look compared to specialty care primary care? Uh, how does insurance play into this? How to play costs into this? You know, what are the differences in experiences? And so I think like there's a general, I think, you know, uh a lack of of research in the general understanding of the veterinary care system. I think that'd be really, really helpful, but specifically focus on access. I think specialty care is really interesting. Rurality is really, really interesting, and obviously we focus on dogs because you know, personal biases, I guess, play into this, but also dogs are the most common animal that people have. Cats might be an interesting thing, or I know Lisa is worried about horses. So, you know, that might be a totally different story. You know, you might be really challenged even getting into preventive care for a horse. Uh, I don't know enough about it, but you know, that that seems like a challenge. Or, you know, there's lots to explore here. I think that's lots of opportunities. I think more people uh ought to look into it.

Sarah Wright 19:00

Well, personally, I look forward to seeing what you come out with about cats, and if that's on the future horizon as a cat owner myself.

SPEAKER_03 19:07

Yeah, it was one of the things I was really curious about, you know, do veterinarians discriminate uh between dot and slides in the access. And like hopefully we can do some work on that in the future.

Sarah Wright 19:17

Well, very cool. Thank you again so much, Simon, for joining us. I always learn something new every time we interview you and every time I read one of your articles. So thank you.

SPEAKER_03 19:24

I appreciate it. Thanks for having me.

Sarah Wright 19:26

Thanks, Simon. For our listeners and viewers, you can read Simon's article on Javma. I'm Sarah Wright here at Lisa Fortier. Be sure to tune in next week for another episode of Veterinary Vertex. And don't forget to leave us a ready and review on F a podcast or wherever you listen.