I took my 7 1/2 year old pure bred Basset in because we noticed he had a growth (tumor) by his back leg in October. Our normal vet, Dr. Gillespie was not there, so I spoke with Dr. Terry Silkman. When I spoke with Dr. Silkman, I advised him numerous of times that we see Dr. Gillespie and Dr. Silkman NEVER advised me that he was no longer there. He advised that my Basset needed surgery and gave us a list of expenses. One of the expenses was a biopsy of the tumor. When I asked Dr. Silkman what they all do concerning the biopsy, all he told me was it was to insure that he got all of the tumor. Dr. Silkman did not tell me that the biopsy of the tumor tells them what stage it is in or what kind of tumor it was. Our bill/statement list of expenses ranged from $1,000.00 to $1600.00. When my husband took our dog in for the surgery, the cost was the high of $1600.00 when he came and picked him up. When my husband asked for more detail of the bill, the front desk person advised that she would need to get the doctor. Dr. Silkman came out and yelled at my husband for even asking for him to explain the expenses. My husband advised Dr. Silkman that we usually have Dr. Gillespie look at our dogs and that is when we found out that our vet, Dr. Gillespie was no longer there. Because of the unprofessionalism, we decided to take our dog to another vet after the staples were removed from the surgery. We took our dog back in 2 weeks later, got the staples removed and all Dr. Silkman said was he looked good. He did not advise us of anything to look for within the next few weeks. Within a week, our basset got an infection and we noticed that there was fluid around the incision. We then took him to a new vet and they looked at him and gave us some medication for the inflammation and the infection. A week later, our basset for 7 1/2 years died within a month from getting his surgery from Dr. Silkman. I cannot believe that Dr. Silkman is even in business still, the way he treats his customers. His professionalism and care for the pet owners and the pets are despicable. I spoke to our new vet and asked why our basset died and he advised that it was tumor related. If we knew what we knew now, we would have gotten the biopsy done and made a decision on what to do from that biopsy. We really did not have the information needed to make an educated decision. It just seems all they wanted was our money and nothing else. Dr. Silkman as no compassion, no professionalism and all he cared about was how much money to soak us with. DO NOT TAKE YOUR PET HERE!!
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