VCA ASEC

Reviews

• MB

  Marthina Booysen

  Jan 23, 2026
  1.0
  Save yourself the time and take your fur baby somewhere else. I brought my 4 month old puppy in at 4am with dehydration because he had been throwing up and having diarrhea all night. There were no other customers there and they left us in the holding room for 2 hours and no sign of the vet! I had to go up to the front desk to ask her how much longer it was going to take and the lady didn't even know that we were still in the holding room. She went to the back to find out an ETA and came back to tell me that a technician would come get my dog's vitals "soon" (we had been there for 2 hours already!). I walked out and scheduled a visit with my actual vet since by that time they were opening soon. There is no point in seeking emergency vet care here when they operate at a snail's pace and clearly do not care about the well-being of the animals. Very disappointed!
• RV

  Ria Vinod

  Jan 20, 2026
  5.0
  saved my kitten’s life! i was previously going to ACCESS animal hospital where i was given such poor, inaccurate, and unhelpful information. once visit to VCA and everything was clear and explained! they even called on my behalf to get me an emergency surgery appointment in san diego that was 5x cheaper than their own facility. forever grateful to everyone here!
• RT

  Reshma Thapa

  Dec 22, 2025
  1.0
  Extremely disappointing, misleading, and heartless care, would not recommend I am extremely disappointed and heartbroken by the care my cat received at VCA ASEC. My girl was running a dangerously high 105.9°F fever, yet despite the urgency, it took 12 hours just to collect a simple urine sample. I brought her in around 6 PM. The intake and initial process alone took nearly three hours. After finally seeing her around 10 PM, I trusted them enough to leave her there overnight, believing she would be closely monitored and treated promptly. Instead, they had nine full hours and did nothing meaningful. Blood and urine were drawn only at the very last minute, and antibiotics were administered after significant delay. My cat remained in emergency care for two days with a fever reaching 106°F. I then received a call stating: “Her fever is still high, the tests didn’t reveal anything, and she now needs another blood draw to test for infections,” which of course meant additional charges. My question to the doctor was simple: Why did it take so many hours to draw blood and urine? These could have been done earlier, antibiotics could have been started sooner, and her fever may have been brought under control. If infection testing was necessary, why wasn’t it done on the first blood sample? The doctor had no explanation and went silent. On top of this, VCA ASEC failed to disclose upfront that they do not carry blood for cats. This critical information was only shared after I had already approved and paid for blood-related tests and procedures. I was then told they would have to rely on a donor who might arrive after a day or more and even that was not guaranteed. This lack of transparency directly delayed my cat’s treatment. Throughout the night, her fever was never controlled, and no one could provide clear answers. It felt like care was based on guesswork rather than a clear medical plan. Delaying antibiotics in an emergency hospital is unacceptable. What made this experience even worse was the complete lack of compassion. Every conversation focused on cost warnings instead of whether the treatment would actually help my cat. Test after test was pushed without allowing time for medication to work or observing her response. The staff appeared robotic no urgency, no empathy, just business-driven decisions. I was also charged an internal medicine consultant fee, yet no new information was provided. Both shifts repeated the same details nothing new, nothing helpful, and certainly nothing that justified an additional charge. After already paying nearly $4,000, I question why this was not included in standard hospital care. Years ago, when I first adopted my cats, this hospital was compassionate and ethical. Doctors genuinely cared, avoided unnecessary testing, and treated us with kindness. That culture is gone. Ultimately, I lost my girl. The care felt incompetent and poorly supervised. The primary doctor caring for my cat was an intern, and no experienced specialist stepped in when it was clearly needed. The so-called internal medicine system felt like a billing exercise rather than expert consultation. The overnight team appeared to simply wait for the morning doctor instead of taking decisive action. I want to be clear: this review is not about the cost of care. I would have paid anything to save my baby. This is about poor medical judgment, lack of urgency, lack of transparency, and lack of compassion. I also emailed the person in charge requesting answers and accountability. I never received a response. That silence speaks volumes. At this point, this experience feels like a money-driven operation rather than a place of healing. I never imagined I would say this about a hospital entrusted with the lives of our pets. I feel used, unheard, and deeply disappointed. I will never return and strongly warn other pet parents to be extremely cautious.
• AB

  Apryl Boyle

  Dec 20, 2025
  1.0
  UPDATE: After weeks of promises I finally got a long, condescending email explaining that they didn’t do anything wrong. It’s now clear that the attitude and games at the front desk comes from the top. They not only tried to hide from us by ducking under desks, but shooed away people that came out from the back that could help us. Our last visit there was characterized by someone called Brittny gatekeeping and trying to keep medication from us after VCA made a huge mistake and sent us the wrong dose. They made us wait over an hour and insisted that nobody could help us. Finally when a doctor came out, their mistake was fixed immediately. It was shocking how intent Brittny was on trying to get me to leave empty handed. Well, they won. I’m out thousands of dollars with their games. They managed to take a lot of my money and made me spend thousands more on food that he didn’t need to change. They just don’t listen and make it seem like they just try to extract as much money as possible. Many of the doctors are good, however, admin and communication issues have caused numerous delays, extra trips, and cost. They are extremely unorganized, making their mistakes my problem. Really too many to list but we are currently dealing with an incorrect prescription that we can't do anything about, further delaying my dog's treatment. We had to come here for a specialist and won't be returning if we can help it. That's the issue - there are only a few internal medicine specialists so options are limited. Not recommended.
• SI

  Sarah Irani

  Dec 11, 2025
  2.0
  I would NOT recommend their ER. I am so upset with how things were handled on the night of 12/10/25. I took my cat in for blood in stool and they told me there wasn’t anyone to do ultrasound and I’d have to go back in the morning. My cat was screaming bloody murder in the back, getting labs that he just had 2 days ago at another VCA, an an x ray that he was supposedly sedated for but was still screaming at the top of his lungs. All of this and I told the ER vet I didn’t want to wait for lab results if I’d have to be back in the morning + I would’ve waited to give my cat gabapentin vs being sedated for exams because I was coming back in less than 12 hours. Zero common sense as she had me sitting there for 3 hours waiting on lab results while my cat sounded like he was being tortured in the back. She also was looking at past visits and had the dates completely wrong for when I was last at their vet. Just overall odd and seems like she just wanted to rack up the exams for her benefit. I opted to call the next day to create an ultrasound appointment because the last visit I had with Dr. Rorke(?) was one of the most pleasant and I have 0 faith in the ER. It’s my fault for allowing the ER to continue on and I’m extremely upset with how the whole situation was handled. If a human were screaming and couldn’t talk, I’d hope a doctor would stop what they were doing vs continuing on for exams that seemed irrelevant. Even when the tech gave me my cat, he wasn’t sympathetic to the fact that he was just screaming. On the plus side, the front desk staff are very nice and the radiologist from before was too.

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