Veterinary Imaging Costs on the Rise for MRI and CT

Imaging prices are on the rise for Veterinary Medicine

While veterinary hospitals remained open even during shut down, the rest of the world was on a growth hold. Many of my clients reported 11% growth during this time due to an increase in pet ownership as empty shelters hit all-time highs. But with no conferences to attend and no clear answer on what the future held for businesses, many veterinary professionals chose to put a hold on purchasing, especially for pricey toys like MRI and CT.

But why are imaging equipment prices rising during the recovery? There are several reasons for this phenomenon.

Human Hospitals have been holding onto older imaging equipment

With fewer elective surgeries in the time of COVID-19 many human medicine hospitals and imaging centers have also put the purchasing of new equipment on hold. This has a trickle-down effect on the veterinary market. With no used equipment to refurbish, veterinarians are left with either pricey functional units or equipment so old that the hospital is forced to make the decision to replace it. Which leads us to our second reason for high after-market prices on veterinary imaging equipment:

High Demand for After-market Equipment

The age old economics Law of Supply says that when the price rises so will supply, so why doesn’t that ring true for a post COVID-19 veterinary market? While 50% of the adult US population is vaccinated, this isn’t yet true for the rest of the world. Many of these scanners are not made in the United States. We may be up and running and ready to buy and sell MRI and CT scanners, but our human medicine counterparts are unable to replace the scanners we would resell in the veterinary space, due to manufacturing shortages.

More veterinary hospitals are moving towards newer technologies and equipment

For many years the human market has used the veterinary industry as it’s dumping ground. Practices would routinely request trade-ins on the old, outdated, slow machines that have been schlepped onto the animal health industry. With a trend towards improving quality in care and pet owner budgets increasing partly due to insurance, many universities are now operating on new or next-to-new top-grade imaging machines. This gives our residents and interns experience on equipment with much greater capabilities than what we see in private practice.

Competition to attract top specialists is getting steep. Hospitals are learning that they need to consult their current and prospective specialists regarding the equipment choices if they are going to attract and retain their top people. With more frequency we hear that they want diagnostic equipment that will give them the best results -who doesn’t want to take pride in their work?

As all of these trends scale upwards, hospitals have more competition for high-quality, gently-used imaging equipment. Plan to spend a little more for quality refurbished MRI and CT equipment until manufacturing can catch up to demand.

Contact an AnimalScan representative today to discuss your imaging options.