Success
"Antech's partnership allows us to focus on what we love most - more time caring for patients."
Nicole Sheehan, DVM, CVA, CVCH, CVFT, Veterinarian and Founder, Whole Pet Veterinary Hospitals
You can experience the impact of our reference lab, right in your practice.
Here’s how.
If you had told Dr. Nicole Sheehan ten years ago that she would create and run her own practice, she might not have believed you — but she did! In 2013, Dr. Sheehan founded Whole Pet Veterinary Hospital in Davidson, North Carolina. In 2020 and 2021, she expanded into Wilmington and Charlotte, creating three practices renowned for their quality of care, efficiency, and a team of dedicated hearts.
Dr. Sheehan and her team at Whole Pet Veterinary Hospitals run annual bloodwork on all of her patients. They work with Antech as their reference lab partner to help with all of their routine and specialty diagnostics.
A comprehensive approach was taken
17 Clinics
15 Cities
22 page survey
488 respondents
Vets, assistants, Techs, and Office Managers.
Performed economic analysis and benchmarked against both publicly available and Antech proprietary data sets
1624 pet owner responses
50-50 dogs & cats
Finding #1
Many veterinarians and their staff believe that the value of same-day results is not worth the hidden stress (and cost) it places on an already stressed system.
In the post-peak pandemic era, veterinary clinics are experiencing compound staff changes
Post-pandemic stress is much higher than pre-pandemic
Vets, Vet-techs, Practice Managers
DVMs seeking less work and early retirement
Percentage of veterinarians want to work fewer hours for lower compensation
Higher turnover among DVMs compared to human medicine
Employee turnover
78% of respondents confirmed staffing shortages in at least one role type
(Vet Nurses & Vets)
In a staff shortage environment, placing greater focus on staff retention becomes important
Most pet owners do not expect same-day results
74%
Of pet owners are willing to receive wellness test results the next day
62%
of pet owners are willing to wait till next day even for sick animal results
Finding #2
In-house diagnostics are a requirement for urgent and critical care workups.
However……
This is not necessarily the case for pre-anesthetic and general wellness testing.
92% of vets consider pre-anesthetic blood work performed prior to the day of procedure acceptable
Four weeks is the professional acceptable consensus
Practices agree that wellness testing is more accurate, more efficient and fast enough when sent to reference labs.
TESTING ACCURACY
“The accuracy of CBC/chem/UAs performed at the reference lab is superior to that of CBC/chem/UAs performed in house”
~60%
vs
“In-house accuracy is equivalent or superior to that of send out CBC/chem/UAs”
~17%
EFFICIENCY OF WORKFLOW
“Sending CBC/chem/UAs to the reference lab provides for a more efficient practice workflow”
~65%
vs
“Performing CBC/chem/UAs in-house provides for a more efficient practice workflow”
~23%
TURNAROUND TIME
“The turnaround time on my CBC/chem/UAs sent to the reference lab is fast enough“
~80%
vs
“The turnaround time on my CBC/chem?UAs is too long“
~15%
In-house fecal flotations were reported by technicians as the least satisfying diagnostic workflow
Enjoyment Level Among Technicians
Values represent the employment level on a scale of 1-10. Overall mean of 7.02
Drawing blood 9.60
Treatment patient 8.50
Bloodwork in-house 8.01
Client Education 7.66
Administering anesthesia 7.46
Sending out reference lab 7.30
Technician appointment 7.02
Communicating results 6.83
Discussing treatments 6.66
Performing patient restraint 6.35
Trimming nails 4.90
Fecal flotation 4.5
Sending fecals out makes for a better practice
In a controlled fecal pilot,
Antech saw 2.5x
more positives than in-house testing
94% 
of the clinicians surveyed in the fecal pilot agree with the statement “send out for fecals produces more accurate results” .
97% of VT’s
84% of VA’s
agree that fecal sends out improve hospital workflow
Technicians and assistants, when asked about selecting a practice of their choice, overwhelmingly respond that they
would rather work at a practice that sends out fecal testing
to the reference library
Finding #3
Leaning more heavily on send-out labs unlocks “found capacity” which could translate to:
A. Up to $120k per vet per year
B. A lower stress work enviroment
Adding 30+ minutes of wait time to a patient visit is stressful for the patient and the practice
Time/motion studies unexpectedly revealed that running comprehensive wellness testing in-house adds 30+ minutes to the patient visit.
Why not capture 2 – 5 new appointments per vet per day, yielding:
$120K
Revenue per vet / per year
Why not use the found capacity to slow the pace of the practice while proving a boost to staff morale and retention
