VCA Holly Street Animal Hospital

I was amazed at the amount of research Dr. Blaiser did in trying to find the correct diagnosis for my dog’s tumor. She showed how much she cares about animals. I do think VCA over all over charges.

This place is great! My boyfriend and I just got a cat back in November and recently we noticed she had a ear infection — we hadn’t picked out a vet for her yet and someone suggested we go to the VCA. I’m so glad we did! they were so accommodating and so helpful. They treated us and our cat with respect! They gave us drops for her ears and within a week we saw a huge difference! We will absolutely be back here– I think we have found a wonderful place!

Thank you Dr Fischer for taking such good care of our Boodah and Cosette today! They were so calm in your gentle presence.

I’m a new customer, been there 3 times. two office visits and one perscription pick up. and I realy like the place. everybody is nice, friendly, and helpfull. my dog has been sick and seen by Dr. Kim Dean and «Annie» and I think she is doing a great job in helping Annie get well. it is VERY impressive that the Dr. takes time, late at night (well after buisness hours) to email me checking up on Annie’s progress.
So far I highly recomend!

Another 5 star vote for Dr. Yick. I take both of my cats to her (12 years and 1.5 years) and I leave appointments feeling I’ve received solid, honest treatment advice. She knows her stuff, is super attentive to my cats and will break things down in terms/​analogies I can understand.
The front desk has always been friendly and they always help to fit me in for appointments with Dr. Yick.

Terrific team who really care about what they are doing. Appointments are efficient and I leave with an understanding of what I need to do to keep my animal healthy. The guidance that I get from the vets and staff is genuinely in the best interests of the health of my pet and my bank account :).

I have been coming to Holly Street for 11+ years. The doctors are all great and they care for your pets. The problem, in my opinion, isn’t the front staff, it is the PROCESS that the front staff has to deal with. First it takes way too long for the doctors’ notes to make it to the front. Maybe it is time to get iPads and have the doctors or one of the assistants enter everything online?! Next their computers are painfully slow. Come on VCA, pick it up and improve the check in and check out routines. it is WAY overdue.

Megan Blasier Duvall is FANTASTIC for small pets. Very passionate, understanding, and committed to helping
I really can’t say enough about her. Ask for Megan if you have a small pet.
Thank you Megan!!!

Love them. All the vets and techs take great care of my furr babies. I have a cat with a difficult to diagnose illness, and this office just happened to have a kitty GI specialist. The bill was reasonable considering the ultrasounds and all of the blood tests that needed to be done, but it was worth it. My 14 year old male cat is still with us, and I owe that to Dr. Christianson and the rest of the crew. Even though I no longer work right across the street, I will continue to take my cat to this vet clinic even though it is a 35 mile drive each way from where I live. Once you find a great doc, you gotta stay with him/​her.

Five stars for DR. Yick! She has been so attentive in the years I have gone with my dog to her. She ensures to answer every question i have and is always knowledgable about my pets needs. She has gone out of her way for my pet and I couldn’t be more thankful. I have traveled internationally twice with my dog and she has done all paperwork, research and guided me through the process with ease. My dog love her and we love her too! Make sure to stop in and see her, would give more stars if possible!

This review is so overdue! Back in 2012 my boyfriend and I adopted a boy kitty, Chester and a girl kitty, Daisy Duke from this hospital. Their mom had her babies at the hospital. Every single time we come in they remember our fur babies and always play with them. I think some of the workers have the mom and the siblings. The hospital is clean, fairly priced and the staff is so friendly!

To contrast the lower ratings, I can definitely say I had a very POSITIVE experience with Holly Street VCA. Every single person I dealt with was sweet, genuine, and very helpful.
We actually are return customers… the only reason we switched vets was moving into the city and commuting for appointments during work was much easier. Our dog Charlie is 13, so these visits are starting to become a bit more frequent, making the right vet that much more important to us. Long story short, we were having great service at our new vet but when it came time to schedule dental surgery we were quoted fairly high and just didn’t feel right about it with them for some reason. (Scheduled, rescheduled, and finally cancelled appointments — we were that unsure.) This all happened over the holidays and we were actually scheduled for a dental surgery at said city vet on this past Friday morning and made the decision to call Holly Street to get a 2^nd opinion and quote, etc.
Basically, that phone call experience confirmed our gut feeling and was a complete 180 from the other place we were dealing with. The person I spoke with at Holly Street was absolutely genuine, did their best to answer all of my questions, gave their best opinion, and actually CARED. Things I did not vibe from the other place. Dental surgeries may seem routine, but if my dog is being put under and the cost is upwards of $ 1000 – 2000 I’d like to feel good about who I’m trusting with my pet.
Fast forward to today, aka the «day after surgery» and not only did everything go smoothly, they had already emailed quotes, treatment plans, gone over every little detail more than once, sat with me and Charlie after to answer any questions and go over his antibiotics, etc. and gave a detailed written treatment plan again AND the cost ended up being under our low end of the estimate even though he had multiple teeth pulled. It helped they were having a dental discount, however it was still amazing to hear. They have called to check in and see how he is doing and have been nothing but reassuring and helpful.
We’ve dealt with multiple vets, and multiple front desk employees and I would NEVER say a negative experience or review.
I HIGHLY recommend this vet and we will be continuing to come back here and choose to commute from the city rather than see another vet.

HORRIBLE Front Desk Admins. The first people you meet there should be kind and smiling, asking how they can help. Especially when you are happy to see them. Not here. They should also be quick with paperwork and trying to get your bill quickly done so you can pay and leave. Especially when you have money and want to pay. Not here.
PLEASE DO SOMETHING ABOUT YOUR FRONT DESK ADMINS. They need a primer on Customer Service Care. Such a shame, since the vet we saw here was good and knowledgable.

Never again. BUYER BEWARE IF YOU GO HERE.
If you make the foolish mistake as I did and go and they prescribe medication — make sure they explain if it is a prescription or a single dose. They put down both on my sheet, but didn’t clarify that some were a prescription that I would take home, and some were a single dose for $ 50.
Everybody in the waiting room had problems with the service. One person checked in, waited for an hour then they said «oh, the person at the desk never checked you in. Sorry!». Saw it first hand.
Spent maybe 5 minutes with the dr. They come back with a «treatment plan» explained to you by a tech. If you have questions, you have to put up a stink to see the dr again. I waited for almost an hour to ask questions about the treatment plan. Then to find out i’d been charged $ 100 for two individual doses of medication instead of prescriptions — that last a total of 8 hours?
I should have realized when every vet is full but they have multiple appointments available that something is wrong… NEVER AGAIN!!!

Dr. Christiansen is heaven sent! I am so lucky my girls have the best veterinarian in town. We’ve been seeing Dr. Christiansen for over 3 years now and I have nothing but terrific things to say about him. He truly cares about my relationship with each dog and understands my concerns, he regards them as my family and the care be provides is unmatched– you can’t put a price on it.
I think the price is no issue for the kind of treatment and care the animals get here. The staff is friendly and efficient, and they are all really good about getting to know each of their patients so there’s an extra level of comfort as a dog mom when I leave them in their care.

I’m absolutely shocked that VCA Holly St. has 3.5 stars!
I keep telling myself, do not got back there but over time I forget just how much this place is all about young vets and $$$. My visit last week, the very young vet must have used the word «package» 5 times in her 2 minutes in the room with us. Yes package, as in I can’t tell you ANYTHING BUT if you really want to know what’s wrong with your dog you’ll need to purchase our $ 500 package. If that’s too much we have a package for $ 350 but I really recommend the $ 500 package. I’m sorry I thought I was at a medical facility not a used car sales lot. Thinking back this was exactly the same treatment we got the time before for a entirely different medical issue. So basically I have the honor of paying them $ 70 for them to try to sell me a $ 500 package pretty much no matter what the problem is.
As a friend of mine pointed out, the vets are so young and inexperienced that’s all they can do is recommend a package. The last one didn’t even take my dogs temperature. I think my dog was disappointed ;)
Stay away, stay far far away. I highly recommend NOT going here. Find a real vet.

Would give this place five stars if the front desk staff wasn’t as dense as all of the Unilocal reviews lead to believe. Called the day before my appointment on recommendation and the front desk said that first visit was always free, and they could get us in the very next day. Felt too good to be true.
Got there, had a very nice appointment with Dr.Yick. She is super enthusiastic, helpful and genuinely cares about your pet. Totally worth dealing with the reception staff for her.
Upon finishing up, I checked my bill which included a 70 $ appointment fee. I asked if the first appointment was free, and they said «oh do you have the coupon?» I had never heard of said coupon, so both women at the front desk agreed that they should charge for the visit. I’m not that hard up for 70 $ honestly, but its just shitty business. Had we not had a better experience with the vet and one or two members of the staff I would never return.
Very cold, lame, dense front desk staff. Request Dr. Yick.

Front Desk: They go above and beyond. Examples: 1. Called asking about a tick in my dog; should I worry? They assisted without having to come in. 2. I didn’t have my VIP vaccination records. They called, got them and sent me soft copies of their records.
Dr, Yick and Dr, Duvall take all the time we need to explore the situation, explain the options and are always sure to define what is necessary, next steps and other options.
Techies: Wow — sweet to my dogs, patient. One has to have her blood pressure tested and that takes a LOT of time and loving to calm her down.
There are a couple of Doctors that while I feel they are *extremely* capable, I feel I am being upsold. I just stand my ground with them.

Dr. Kim Dean DVM the vet recommended that our cat of 13 – 14 years old get his teeth cleaned as he had a build-​up of plaque. He was also diagnosed with stage one renal disease and she thought that his poor teeth health may be a contribution to his renal disease.
We decided to take her recommendation and have his teeth cleaned b/​c of the possibility that it may be connected to his renal problems. During the procedure they also extracted 2 teeth — she said both teeth had a cavity below the gums and jaw line. They charged us $ 875 which we were very surprised.
During the anesthesia process which requires putting a tube down his throat they punctured his throat with a small hole and now he has air in between his skin and is having difficulty breathing. Clearly, he is very uncomfortable and in pain. They gave him antibiotics and pain medication and said it will take up to 2 – 3 weeks for the tear to heal itself and close.
My cat was perfectly fine when we took him in. He was happy, ate frequently which indicated to us that his teeth was not bothering him.
** I advise everyone who is considering having their cat’s teeth cleaned to consider the risks very carefully. ** We never thought in a million years that this would have turned out as badly as it has — it was suppose to be teeth clean.
It’s been 3 years and I still think about what a big mistake I made taking our cat to the VCA and allowing Dr. Kim Dean DVM to talk us into extracting his teeth. I recommend if you have an old animal and their eating fine and he is diagnosed with renal disease which I found out that renal disease is common in old animals — do nothing. Because of the bad choice I made, the last 4 months of my cat’s life was miserable for him. I wish I left him alone to live a comfortable life to the end instead of putting them in the hands of a vet right out of college.

We had been bringing our cat here exclusively, since we first got him as a kitten. That’s 7 years, I think. It was before Holly Street became a VCA franchise or whatever — it was just a small independent vet clinic. We were walking distance away and could always get same-​day appointments for the minor problems we have with the cat. When we found yarn hanging out of his you-​know-​where, they saw him same day to make sure he didn’t have a lot of it tangled in his intestinal tract (and to tell my daughter not to leave her knitting out where he could get it!) When he got his first UTI problem, they saw him, cultured his urine, and prescribed on the same day.
Unfortunately, since the change, we can no longer have them as our care provider. EVERY TIME we call, they don’t have available appointments or walk-​in times. Last night we realized our cat was in pain with a urinary problem. I put a request out online for an appointment here, and we called first thing in the morning. My understanding is that male urinary tract problems are serious — the cat is unable to pee — and should be treated immediately. Well, it doesn’t matter, because the earliest they can see is is at least a day away. Same thing every other time we’ve called. It doesn’t matter that our cat is an established patient. Apparently you have to pre-​schedule your emergency vet needs at Holly Street VCA, if you want a timely appointment.
So, now for yet another time, we’re taking our cat to the other nearby vet. And I feel like if we’ve not been able to actually take our cat to Holly Street VCA in over a year, we should just give up and consider them our former vet. I think it’s really a shame, because I will miss being able to walk a block to the vet — but if I can’t get an appointment, I need to move on.