We all love our pets and want to keep them healthy.
Getting medicine for your pet typically requires a trip to the veterinarian’s office, but with online outlets springing up, pet owners are enticed by money saving offers. Contact 16 has a warning for pet owners: beware of online pet medications. Buyer beware
Keeping pets healthy has been Veterinarian, Dr. William Mack’s job for more than 30 years.
He’s a veterinarian at the New Prairie Small Animal Clinic in Rolling Prairie.
Doctor Mack prescribes a variety of drugs for sick pets, with pain medicine being the most common.
Now however, with the help of the Internet, you can buy those same pet medicines online. Contact 16 Googled pet medications and received over seven million hits.
“One of the biggest concerns I have about that is the quality of the medicine,” says Dr. Mack.
Unfortunately, Dr. Mack says there’s no way to guarantee the quality of the drugs offered for sale online. “I’ve heard that there’s a possibility that maybe the purity or the strength of the medicine that they’re getting may not be good,” he says.
Also, pets face many of the same risks as people do when drugs are purchased on the Internet, especially from an obscure or new outlet.
“There’s not going to be anybody there if they run into a problem with the medicine,” says Dr. Mack. “For example, if it were a heart worm medicine and this animal happened to have heart worms and had babies and they gave them that medicine, they could have a reaction. The severity of the reaction could even be death.”
Tips to keep your pet safe:
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When you are counting your savings, be sure to include shipping costs and any state tax. Ask at your vet’s office what the medication will cost. Then do some comparison-shopping online. Some vets will give you the better deal.
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Also, most .
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Find out how long it is likely to take for the medication to get to you. If the medication is something your pet needs immediately, it’s probably better not to wait.
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If you are unsure about the quality of the outlet you want to order from, call the site’s toll-free number and ask some questions.
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Finally, find out where the company is located, how long it has been in business and if it has experienced any problems with state regulators.
via www.wndu.com
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