By Leah O’Donnell
Healthy Planet Lifestyles Editor
When it comes to keeping your pet healthy, one of the top priorities is the veterinary care your pet receives. After all, you and your pet will spend years frequenting your veterinarian’s office for exams, medications, foods, or dental cleanings. Finding a veterinary clinic that meets your needs and the needs of your pet is so important. With this in mind, my Planet Pet Pick this month is Clarkson-Wilson Veterinary Clinic. This cutting edge clinic can meet the needs of any and all pets, literally. Known for their expertise with exotics (and the dogs and cats too), Clarkson-Wilson has experience with everything from pocket pets to alpacas. They also offer full service medicine, surgical work up and treatments, cold laser therapy, and in house blood work ups. The clinic provides emergency availability 24 hours a day, seven days a week. Pet parents can reach someone anytime, day or night! The practice includes owner Dr. Doug Pernikoff, Dr. Pam Von Behrens, and Dr. Tim Sullivan. The veterinarians at Clarkson-Wilson emphasize patient care and pet owner education combined with high-tech medicine and surgery. As Dr. Doug Pernikoff says, “we treat with our hearts.”
Clarkson-Wilson Veterinary Clinic opened in 1995 when Dr. Doug returned to St. Louis after working in conservation medicine and research for some time. His interest in exotic wild life grew from his residency at the St. Louis Zoo. Of course, cats, dogs, and pocket pets are primarily the critters he sees today, but his education and background give him the tools to treat all creatures great and small. The specialty services available at Clarkson-Wilson are numerous. One of the unique services is cold laser therapy. This therapy is used for physical rehabilitation, pain management, and wound management. The effectiveness of this treatment is astounding. Another distinctive service is the in depth medicine work ups and treatments that Dr. Pam Von Behrens provides. Figuring out what works best for your pet is the goal of Dr. Von Behrens. Clarkson-Wilson Veterinary Clinic is one of the few places to offer tendonectomy for cats. This is a less traumatic approach to managing nails with cats that prevents extension of the nails, while still leaving them intact-a perfect alternative to declawing. Clarkson-Wilson Veterinary Clinic supports holistic efforts conjoined with traditional medicine and surgical technologies. The ability to go to one place to receive the high tech services provided at Clarkson-Wilson Veterinary Clinic makes this clinic one of a kind.
I suppose Dr. Doug was not busy enough running Clarkson-Wilson Veterinary Clinic, because his love of animals inspired him to create a non-profit rescue and adoption program called Vet Pet Rescue. Since its start in 2009, over 750 animals have been saved from euthanasia. Clarkson-Wilson Veterinary Clinic also provides near cost vet care services to other local animal rescue groups as well. They do vaccine clinics each month and adoption events for the animals that are in foster care with their Vet Pet Rescue organization. In November, Vet Pet Rescue will be at Pet Supplies Plus, located at 15311 Manchester Road in Ballwin, MO 63011 on November 13th and November 27th from 12 p.m. to 4 p.m. with pets available for adoption. Learn more about Vet Pet Rescue by visiting www.vet-petrescue.org.
In addition to the responsibilities of Clarkson-Wilson Veterinary Clinic and Vet Pet Rescue, Dr. Doug appears every Wednesday at 4:30 p.m. live on the Frank O. Pinion Show on KTRS radio. He is also the consulting veterinarian for the World Bird Sanctuary. Dr. Doug works to educate and inform pet owners so that their pet’s lives can be as happy and healthy as possible. When I asked Dr. Doug what he enjoys most about his job, he quickly replied, “It’s great working with a diversity of animals that challenge us to continue our learning process and I also enjoy the relationships with our pet owners.”
Clarkson-Wilson Veterinary Clinic, 32 Clarkson Wilson Center, Chesterfield, MO 63017. Call 636-530-1808 or email Dr. Doug at dpernikoff@gmail.com.