Westgate Pet & Bird Hospital — Local services in Austin

I am adding on this review after 4 years. I will make it short. I am still not over this horrible place literally killing my cat, Sky. I had an appt for her the day they killed her because she was not feeling up to par. I took her in about 5 minutes early and they actually got mad and said they were busy. They did a cursory exam and then asked me how much I wanted to spend on her!!!!! Next thing I know they have this horrible contraption out actually putting my cat to sleep. They wanted me to help. I was and still am devastated. They then charged me $800.00 to kill her. Next day, my other cat started exhibiting the same symptoms so I took her to the emergency clinic nearby. Within an hour they had given her a blood transfusion and she was on the road to recovery. I picked Sky up the next day and to this day she has never been ill again. Both my cats were ill with a same common ailment but this vet office vet could not even tell what was wrong- it was low on blood from flea bites. It was NOT some rare disease! They are incompetent!

This vet office was so incompetent they let my 4 year old cat die when they could easily have saved her with a blood transfusion. I brought in my healthy 4 year old female cat around noon on a Friday and by 4 o'clock she was dead. The first thing they told me about her was she was anemic due to the very visible symptoms of pale gums and lethargy. They noted she also had fleas even though I regularly gave her a topical flea medication Advantage II. NOTE: If you type in these three symptoms online it comes up the cat needs a blood transfusion. If only they had done that my beautiful cat would still be alive. Four hours after bringing my cat in to their office in distress they delivered me a dead cat and a bill for almost $800.00 telling me they had no idea in the world what had been wrong with her. I had asked nicely about an hour after I brough her in if I could see her and they reluctantly agreed and there she was all by herself in a cage with no one even helping her. I felt they hurried me as I wanted to tell her to hang on with all she had. She perked up so I mistakenly belived she was going to make it. Was I ever wrong. She "crashed" (their words) about an hour or so later. That was that. So I paid the outrageous bill and left not having any idea what had killed her. About a week later one of my other cats had the same identical symptoms happen to her so i rushed her to a different vet. They immediately diagnosed what was wrong with her (within 5-8 minutes) and she was given a blood transfusion and the next morning she was alert and seemed well. Within a couple of days she was back to her happy self. Now Westgate vet office will not even discuss this matter with me so I am now taking legal measures to get justice for my cat I loved so much it feels like I lost a child. I would not have this degree of sadness it if I had taken her to the right vet in the first place. The other thing is all my cats regularly get flea medicine but the new vet told me there is an ingredient in Advantage II that is making the fleas resistant to this medicine. These 2 particular cats were a healthy weight and never acted sick or scratched themsleves and I never noticed fleas. This vet office is guilty of gross incompetence at not realizing a very simple cure available. My very loved cat would still be free to live her life she enjoyed so much if they had just used their heads. I am still in disbelief how they missed this. I will note that in the week before my other cat got sick I finally got Dr. brandt to return my call and he told me my cat Sky had some rare disease no one has ever heard of. He told me this garbage just to shut me up, he was not even the one treating Sky. Well, we will see what the courts have to say about this matter. No one should be treating sick animals if they do not know what they are doing!! And last but not least what really struck me as cold dr. brandt actually told me "Yeah, we had to drop everything we were doing to help...

I've been taking my dogs to Westgate since I moved to Austin in 2006. If you've read previous reviews you may have read the one my brother-in-law wrote about my dog being an absolute terror when it comes to grooming. Seriously, I couldn't find any place in the city that would even agree for her to be in the building for a minute. Westgate was pretty far from my house, but ended up being worth it. Their groomer, Lara, is incredible. She recognized the anxiety Belle has and knew how best to handle the situation and involved me in the process. The staff knows that Belle is hard to handle, but they always keep her in mind. Rather than them taking her to the grooming table or going to the back to get her post grooming, they allow me to venture back there since it helps calm Belle to see me.

So that was grooming. Only one small part of what Westgate does. No doubt about it though, their other services are incredible. Dr. Brandt is our vet and he's amazing. I Belle has been seeing him for a few years and, more recently, my adopted puppy, Pixel. The first month I had Pixel, I took the dogs in for rabies vaccination and puppy shots. After the shots, Dr. Brandt asked how things were going and I just let everything spill out on how overwhelmed I was and all the concerns I was having. You see, I was having issues with both dogs behaviorally. Belle is an older dog (9) set in her ways and very much the alpha and Pixel was a rescue puppy that hadn't had the best of her early years to learn bite inhibition and other dog manners. The fighting was non-stop and very aggressive at times. I was having a lot of thoughts on returning Pixel... After I gushed to Dr. Brandt, he calmly and thoroughly explained so much about dog behavior and what his best idea was of why they were acting those ways and what I can do to help the situation. It was incredible. No, the problem wasn't fixed overnight, but my little family has made great progress together.

I know this review is getting to be lengthy...or already is, but I honestly have so many good things to relay about Westgate. The groomer is wonderful. The vet is wonderful. The staff and vet techs are also wonderful. Pixel jumped out of the window of a moving car (she had never done this before) and one time Belle got extremely sick in the middle of the night. I was able to call Westgate and get phone advice on what to do as I'm panicking. The resources they have around the city of emergency care places closer to me or trainers to assist in specific issues is plentiful. I always feel comfortable walking into their business and everybody always has a smile on their face and calming demeanor.

I truly hope that if you are looking for a vet or groomer that you'll give them a chance to be yours and your pets. I drive through so much traffic every time I need them and every time the traffic is worth it! Discounts given on Tuesdays and certain months for seniors or puppies are also...

Our favorite Bird Vet!

Westgate Pet and Bird Hospital was my first and last stop in choosing a veterinarian for my 30+ birds. Let me be clear—WPBH is not the only avian clinic in the area that I have visited! They were the first bird vet I saw in 2011, then I went and saw all the good ones in Austin/surrounding, and I keep coming back here.

Dr Brandt is always my first choice, but I’ll choose any doctor at this clinic over any other place. From new bird check-ups, surgeries, and euthanasia, they are always kind and compassionate.

Sometimes, I call to schedule an appointment and it will have to happen a couple days in the future (due to my schedule and their availability) but most of what time we are able to get seen on the same day. No biggie, but I saw another reviewer mention there is sometimes a WAIT when you arrive at the clinic, but I haven’t found this to be any more of a wait than I have experienced at other clinics, and if you’re kind and understanding about the wait times, they sometimes apologize with freebies. :-)

Here are just a few recent cases I’ve brought to them:

Feb 2016- a male finch with a broken leg was given to us; Dr Lusk performed his surgery, did a phenomenal job on the amputation, but finch did not wake up from surgery. Lusk kindly discounted much of the surgery charge, since the bird didn’t make it.

June 2016- our brain-damaged Quaker Parrot presented with a slight tic (minor seizure activity) every 15 seconds, and it did not pass on its own. We attempted to go to Feather & Fur since they are closer to our home, but they turned us away when we walked in (despite me calling them beforehand and getting the OK to come in). Dr Lusk at WPBH saw us immediately, and dosed Valium/diazepam twice and seizure activity stopped. We did pay an emergency visit fee, but Lusk was very kind and understanding of us throwing a wrench in his evening schedule.

Feb 2017- a budgie/parakeet with a bitten foot was surrendered to the rescue and needed surgery to repair. Dr Brandt evaluated and decided to try to save the foot rather than perform amputation of whole leg. Surgery and recovery went wonderful.

Today, Oct 2017- We just returned home from having a senior finch euthanized, after she presented with an abdominal mass over the weekend. The clinic was very sympathetic to our loss, did a quick exam to minimize stress on a bird that wasn’t used to being handled, and gave me two options for her euthanasia so I could choose what was best and the least stressing to her.

We love WPBH, and A Parront’s Love Small Bird Rescue doesn’t plan to see another clinic anytime soon. We see this clinic often, and...