Lisa Lent did the drive with her blind golden doodle, Maya, after she was attacked by another dog. It was 10:30 p.m. on a Saturday. They could have waited until the morning. But Maya had a gaping wound near her neck. So she and her husband packed the car and set out for Idaho Falls.
“You’re holding your dog in your lap and just praying that you drive faster,” she said.
Morgan McGlashon and her border collie Névé did the drive in a blizzard.
“I was in the back of the car trying to force feed our dog with black charcoal,” McGlashon said.
For Kate More it happened when her typically healthy golden retriever Cora ate something untoward and ended up with a severe case of gastroenteritis.
“I thought there would still be a vet on call,” she said. But after making calls to all her friends and dog parents, thinking surely somebody’s vet would visit after hours. “The answer across the board was no.”
The lack of nighttime services comes as a surprise to some who learn Jackson is isolated in a moment of crisis. The trips can disrupt work and families.
“For us as pet professionals, it’s just unacceptable,” said Dr. M.J. Forman, who founded one of Jackson’s three veterinary clinics, Spring Creek Animal Hospital, more than thirty years ago.
“I think all of us in the profession feel this almost horror that… something that was treatable turns into not treatable or a patient dies on the way there,” she said.
At the same time, providers are burning out, said vet tech and Spring Creek manager Sumaya Holden. They can’t add extra hours or make the kind of house calls that previous generations of pet owners expected.
Jackson Hole has about 27 doctors, assistants and techs across three facilities. They care for the valley’s estimated 11,000 dogs, plus those just rolling through town. That’s a lot of animals. But it’s still not enough to keep staff employed full time.
So Holden and her boss, Forman, are trying to change that with Veterinary Pulse Alliance. The new nonprofit is trying to raise $3 million to open the area’s first after-hours pet clinic.
It’s not the first time Holden has tried to open an emergency clinic. A nonprofit she wanted to launch in Alpine in 2023 never opened because the finances didn’t work.
“You need a population of about 60,000 people to make it financially viable,” Holden said.
Veterinary Pulse Alliance is joining the county’s more than 300 nonprofits.
Alexandra McLean says Teton County, the country’s richest by some measures, has the resources.
She joined Pet Alliance as executive director after looking for her next act when the U.S. Agency for International Development (USAID) shuttered.
Opening the clinic is a bit different than diplomacy in the Middle East, she said. But she’s excited for the momentum. As are owners like Lent.
“It’s just like donating to search and rescue. You want to hope that you never need their services but we’re so lucky to have them in our community,” she said.
First, Pet Alliance is renovating a rented building in the Target plaza. The nonprofit has so far raised just shy of $1 million. The founders need to double that for a November opening. And raise an additional million to operate for the first year.
Fundraising will drop off slightly after initial construction, Forman says. But to keep staff through 14-hour night shifts, philanthropy won’t ever go away.
“We tried two or three times over the years to actually hire an additional veterinarian to work after hours and weekends and holidays exclusively. And it failed miserably from a financial standpoint,” Forman said.
Pricing will be comparable to daytime care and the current Idaho Falls alternatives, she said. Livestock won’t be welcome at the retail hub.
“I don’t think a horse or cow out in the parking lot would go over too well with the landlord,” Forman joked.
But the founders do hope to recruit vets who can see specialty pets like iguanas and birds.
