This is an archived article that was published on sltrib.com in 2013, and information in the article may be outdated. It is provided only for personal research purposes and may not be reprinted.
Hours after Summer Thatcher brought her English mastiff pup to Quail Pointe Veterinary Hospital for a routine spay, the dog bled out internally in her arms.
The Utah woman said she expressed concern at the April appointment that 13-month-old Athena was in heat, and veterinarians Kathleen Ford and Mary Smart assured her the dog would be fine.
But Athena began hemorrhaging. Ford removed some organs and couldn't stop the bleeding.
Worse, Thatcher said, was that she was stopped from taking her pet to an emergency room for nearly two hours over a billing argument.
"[Emergency care] said if they would've had her two hours earlier, they could've stopped the bleeding," Thatcher said. "But they held her hostage, and now she's dead."
Thatcher and others criticize the clinic on a heavily trafficked Facebook page called Athena Justice, but Ford denies any malpractice or professional discourtesy. She thinks the accusations are rumor-mongering from owners understandably upset about their pets' medical problems.
"It really hurts our feelings when people who don't know us perpetuate all these rumors and gossip without any evidence," Ford said. "Miss Thatcher is in the grieving process right now, and her facts and ours differ. We haven't been able to defend ourselves until recently."
Thatcher created the page months after her dog's death, asking others to share stories of poor care from the veterinary hospital. Beyond saying the hospital does not use expired medications and follows supervision protocol, Ford declined to address specific allegations made online.
Commenters on the page accuse Ford of bullying customers, indifference and misconduct leading to dead and maimed pets. Several former Quail Pointe employees went online and confirmed many of the accounts. Ford verified their employment in an interview.
"I looked through all these stories and said, 'I remember that, I was there for that,'" said Amanda Clark, a former Quail Pointe veterinary tech.
Thatcher has retained attorney Paul Lydolph III for a malpractice suit. He said the Department of Occupational and Professional Licensing (DOPL) is investigating Quail Pointe, but DOPL can "neither confirm nor deny" that, according to spokeswoman Jennifer Bolton.
Ford said Athena's surgery was performed above the "reasonable standard of care," with disclosure of risks and permission from Thatcher.
"We're always heartbroken when we lose a pet," Ford said. "Athena was a beautiful, beautiful animal."
Ford has practiced for 26 years and says she has never been sued for malpractice.
Lydolph, however, notes lawyers typically avoid veterinary malpractice cases because the possible awards are small. As an animal lover, Lydolph said, he took Thatcher's case on principle after several attorneys turned her down."She just wants her service charges deducted," he said. "[Thatcher] paid them to murder her dog."
A vet accused of malpractice is only responsible for the dead pet's "market value," explained University of California-Berkeley Law School professor Bruce Wagman. Owners cannot claim the emotional damages that can lead to large settlements in a human's wrongful death.
"You have to have another professional come in and determine if what the defendant did was below a reasonable standard of care," Wagman said, "and that costs a lot of money you won't get back."
Some attorneys and activists such as Wagman try to increase possible awards in cases involving companion animals by arguing they should be classified as "property with peculiar value."
The recent renaming of pet "owners" to "guardians" in places such as Berkeley, Calif., and Boulder, Colo., are attempts to raise awareness. The law, said Wagman, needs to come up to speed.
"They're not like computers; they're not like soda bottles," Wagman said. "They live, they breathe. What can we do to increase the way we value these animals?"
Thatcher said she is pushing for the principle, not the money.
"A big part of me wanted to let go and move on with my life," she said. "Then when everyone started responding with their stories, I knew something had to be done."
Twitter: @djsummersmma