March 26, 2025 • 34 mins
Dr. Gianluca Bini introduces Safe Pet Anesthesia, a revolutionary telehealth service bringing board-certified anesthesia expertise to general veterinary practices across the country. This innovative platform connects specialists with veterinary teams via video call during procedures, dramatically improving patient safety while making expert anesthesia care accessible to all pets.
• Only about 200 board-certified veterinary anesthesiologists exist in the US, with most concentrated in academia or specialty hospitals
• Safe Pet Anesthesia allows practices to book specialists who monitor cases remotely via video call from pre-op through recovery
• Monitoring—not drug protocols—is the key to safe anesthesia and preventing complications
• The service costs a fraction of specialty referral prices, making expert care accessible to more pet owners
• Veterinarians can focus on surgical procedures while specialists guide technicians through anesthesia management
• No contracts or minimum commitments required—practices pay per case
• Many clients willingly pay extra for this service when offered as an option
• Technical setup requires just a smartphone, internet connection, and the included tripod mount
• The platform also offers customized training for veterinary teams, both virtually and in-person
Visit safepetanesthesia.com to learn more about bringing specialist-level anesthesia care to your practice.
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Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
(00:01):
Welcome to the Veterinary Blueprint Podcast brought to you
by Butler Vet Insurance.
Hosted by Bill Butler, theVeterinary Blueprint Podcast is
for veterinarians and practicemanagers who are looking to
learn about working on theirpractice instead of in their
practice.
Each episode we will bring yousuccessful, proven blueprints
from others, both inside andoutside the veterinary industry.
(00:21):
Welcome to today's episode.
Bill (00:30):
Welcome to the Veterinary Blueprints podcast.
I'm your host, bill Butler,bringing you business and
entrepreneurship insights forthe veterinary community.
Today we're joined by a specialguest, dr Gianluca Bini, a
board-certified veterinaryanesthesiologist and founder of
Safe Pet Anesthesia.
He recognized the limitedaccess to specialized anesthesia
(00:52):
care and he launched Safe PetAnesthesia to improve patient
health and educate veterinaryteams.
In addition to leading thisinitiative, which I'm sure takes
a lot of his time, he is anassistant professor teaching on
anesthesiology and painmanagement at Oklahoma State
University.
So let's dive into this journeyand impact of expert anesthesia
care for veterinary medicine.
(01:13):
Welcome, dr Beeney.
Gianluca (01:16):
Thank you, bill.
Thank you for having me, andit's a honor being on your
podcast.
Bill (01:21):
Absolutely so.
We met at VMX.
I was just walking around andyou had a beautiful golden
retriever in your booth on thelast day I believe and I just
was like your dog stopped me inmy tracks and I wanted to say
hello and in fact one of youraisle mates said you should go
talk to Dr Beeney.
He's got a very interestingproduct and a past podcast guest
(01:46):
from Vetland, and so we struckup a conversation.
It kind of went from there.
So why don't you tell you knowI got a little bit of your
background, but why don't youshare for our guests?
You know your start toveterinary medicine and how
things got going for you.
Gianluca (02:21):
Yeah, so I started get into that.
In Europe there are very fewplaces where you can do a
residence in anesthesia, and soas soon as I graduated and moved
to England I did twointernships, one in anesthesia
and the other one is a rotatinginternship.
(02:42):
And then I was alwaysfascinated by the States and the
training that you guys haveover here.
It's, you know, really, reallygood and so I wanted to come
over here for my residency.
I applied and I got into aresidency at North Carolina
State University and then, aftercompleting that, I moved to
(03:05):
Ohio State.
I stayed there for two and ahalf years as an assistant
professor of anesthesia andanalgesia there and then, when I
left there and moving here toOklahoma, I really realized how.
You know how little access theaverage veterinarian has to an
(03:27):
anesthesiologist.
Right, there is only about alittle bit more than 200 of us
in the country which, if youthink about it, so that you know
there's people trained inanesthesia.
Bill (03:38):
you know veterinarians receive training in
anesthesiology, but boardcertified anesthesiologists are
a rarity anesthesiology, butboard certified
anesthesiologists are a rarity.
Gianluca (03:52):
Yeah, it's a really rare species, and so, you know,
most of us are in academia or inhighly specialized referral
centers.
Nobody is, you know, dealingwith GPs, nobody's dealing with
mid to small size referrals, andthat's where most actually most
of the pets get anesthetized,which makes it really, really
sad and it limits their accessto one of us terribly.
And so it was like how do wemake this accessible and
(04:16):
affordable for these pets andthese pet owners?
And that's where the idea camefrom for Self-Pet Anesthesia.
We created a custom builtplatform that allowed us to
follow cases and receive videofeeds from different devices.
Most people use a smartphone andthey literally can just book us
(04:38):
for a case, upload the medicalrecord, scan the protocol that
they want to use.
We give them feedback on thatand then, whenever it's time to
perform the anesthetic event,they just put us on their phone
and we follow the whole casefrom start to finish on video
(04:58):
call.
And we make this superaffordable for them.
And this was the only way ofdoing it was to do it online.
If somebody had to go therephysically, between travel and
all that stuff, you know itwould make it insanely expensive
for the average veterinarian,which is not.
Bill (05:14):
So that's a big jump being an academic, you know, ohio
State University, and then goingto Oklahoma and then saying I'm
going to be an entrepreneur,and your wife was with you.
She's kind of your sidekickbusiness partner.
Probably not your sidekick,you're probably her sidekick,
based on how things.
She's your social media person,dog wrangler, she, she, she
(05:38):
looked like she was taking careof everything down there and you
know.
So I met the both of you and sohow do you sit down?
As you know, if there's anotherveterinarian out there who
wants to seize a need in inanimal, animal health, you know
you going from academic academiato saying I want to open a, you
know, entrepreneur, you knowI'm going to become an
(05:59):
entrepreneur and launch thisbusiness.
What does, what did that looklike?
What was that conversation whenyou went home?
Gianluca (06:06):
Yeah, you know it was scary at first.
You know it's kind of a jumpinto the void.
You know you're used to beingon a salary and now you actually
have to invest money andusually you know FYI for whoever
(06:27):
is listening usually the firstcouple of years you actually
lose money.
Yes, you don't make money.
That was an interesting way ofyou know using our savings
really.
Yeah, you got to be passionate.
Bill (06:42):
Well, and there's a Beyonce quote, and Beyonce, uh,
the Beyonce quote goes like thisI don't often gamble.
When I do, I always bet on me.
And so you know, as anentrepreneur, you're betting on
yourself.
That, uh, you're gonna, you'regonna come out ahead when you're
, when you're making those,those, uh, educated guests,
gambles, I guess.
Gianluca (07:02):
Yeah, it's.
You know I.
I really hope that the gamblepays off.
Um, to be honest, like you know, it's been um, it's been a
journey right.
There's a lot of things thatyou really don't know when you
start a business.
You know, and even the smallthings, right.
You know what hosting platformdo you use for your website.
You know even little thingslike that it's so easy to lose.
(07:26):
You know a grand here and thereand like at the end of the year
, when you actually like go andlook at it, you're like holy
crap, how much money I wasted onstuff that I didn't know, that.
Bill (07:40):
You know I should have done different or whatnot, but
that's a national convention, orjust buying t-shirts or
giveaways to pass on.
I mean, like all those littlethings, like, okay, we're going
to go do a booth at a nationalshow, we have to have some stuff
to give away.
What do we want to give away?
Those are $4 each.
Holy cow.
It's going to cost me, you know, $5,000 just to have this stuff
(08:01):
to give away.
And and so, yeah, I think youknow when you, when you go to
start a business, right, there's, there's all, there's the grand
plan.
It's like this is the endvision, but it's all the small
details, from A to Z.
Gianluca (08:17):
Yeah, the costs rack up super easy.
Right, and providing a service,I think, like this, where it's
unheard of right.
Nobody's doing this in thecountry.
Nobody's doing it for GPs,nobody's doing it for small size
referrals.
(08:38):
You know there is a couple ofpeople that do it for highly
specialized places, but you knowthe difference in pricing is
significant.
You know it's hard because alot of veterinarians don't even
know that you exist, they don'teven know that that's an option,
and so, like it's been hard,like you know, having those
(09:01):
conversations and, and you knowa lot of people assume at the
beginning that what you're doingis just give them a list of
drugs that they can use.
And that's exactly what we donot do.
You know we, we, we give youthat, but we follow your whole
case and that's where the the,the juice is.
You know.
Bill (09:22):
So you know if I'm a veterinarian and you know I want
to practice safe anesthesia inmy practice.
You know what do you think orwhat are your.
You know if you're going togive me some of the safe
practice and you know safe petanesthesia essentials for my
practice.
What are some of those?
Gianluca (09:41):
And, yes, this is what I always tell my students.
Right, I give you the answerthat I give to my students and
some of the clients I have thatyou know.
The very first question theyalways ask is what's your
protocol?
What drugs do we use?
Right, and people get hooked upon that.
But in reality, the true answerthere is that it doesn't matter
(10:05):
.
Right, like the drugs that youuse in 99% of pets, it doesn't
really matter.
What matters is that you knowwhat the drugs do and how to fix
it if something happens.
And so monitoring long story,short monitoring is key.
The patients do not die becauseyou use the wrong drug,
(10:28):
assuming that you stay withinthe normal dose range.
Right, like, of course, if yougive the full bottle of ketamine
, for example.
Of course that's a differentstory.
But if you stay within the doserange, the patient doesn't die
because you picked the wrongdrugs or, you know, if you had a
better protocol, the patientwould have survived.
(10:48):
That's not the case.
The reason why the patient diesis because the monitoring was
lacking, somehow.
Right, there is places outthere and nowadays this is rare,
but you know there is.
There were some places, atleast till a few years ago where
there wasn't any monitoring.
You know there was, they wouldmonitor.
You know, pulse oximetry maybe,and that's about it.
(11:10):
And and you know that's notprobably good practice anymore.
Um, you know, we, we should.
Once you have proper monitoringand you have the know-how on,
you know what's happening.
How can I fix this?
That's how you make it safe.
Bill (11:28):
Fixing something before it gets too bad to fix Too bad.
Gianluca (11:32):
Yeah.
Bill (11:33):
In my non-anesthesia layman terms terms.
So you know I've gone underanesthesia personally a couple
times.
For a couple you knowprocedures I'd broken a leg and
needed a metal plate, my leg.
And you know you go talk to theorthopedic, but when you're,
(11:54):
when you're getting ready to goin, I go speak with the
anesthesiologist before goingunder anesthesia.
And so you know to relate thisto animal health, my mom had a
Gordon Setter that really hadbad reactions to anesthesia and
and so and any sort ofmedication like that, and so in
the vet world, why don't, whyisn't there more consultation
(12:16):
with anesthesiology before aprocedure?
Gianluca (12:21):
Yeah, part of this is again the lack of personnel,
right, like there isn't enoughof us to cover all that side.
Yeah, you know, it's actually avery easy conversation to have
and a lot of owners nowadaysthey are aware.
You know a lot of people gounder anesthesia more and more
often.
A lot of people had oneanesthesia more and more often.
(12:41):
A lot of people had their oneof their family members go under
and they have seen they hadthat experience with
anesthesiologists and they wouldreally love to have that for
their pet.
A lot of the clients want tohave some reassurance around
(13:02):
anesthesia.
You know, when we started thisbusiness we thought that you
know, veterinarians will call usfor very complex cases.
What we found out is that oncewe are out there in that
practice we end up doing, youknow, a lot of spay and neuters,
which are relatively easy cases.
But the reason is that theowners want that.
(13:25):
You know the owners is like ohmy God, you have something like
this, I want it.
I don't care about the extra.
You know $100, $200.
You know they're like you knowI want to have an
anesthesiologist watch after mypet and so it is an option
nowadays.
You know, with a service likeours.
You know we can speak with theclient too, like if you have a
(13:46):
client that would desire to havea chat with us.
We told them to do itbeforehand and after.
You know, I had actually aconversation with one of the
clients from one of the clinicswe followed the other night and
you know the dog was doing okay,but she wanted some extra
reassurance.
She wanted to speak with one ofus and we did so.
(14:07):
It's doable Nowadays.
It is doable.
It wasn't an option until a fewyears ago.
Bill (14:13):
So, as an entrepreneur myself and sales guy 20 plus
years in the sales world, justthinking about what you just
said if I'm a veterinarian it's,you know, $150 to have a
monitoring of anesthesiology andas I'm putting your pet under
that conversation is I'veincluded in the cost of the spay
(14:37):
neuter monitoring ofanesthesiology.
By this, by this, you know this, this, this organization.
However, you position that as apractice owner, right?
if you don't want that, I canremove it, but just include oh
right and then, and then youknow you're, you're including
that service and, as a pet owner, even if I don't have a
(14:58):
conversation with you, I know mypet's being monitored by
anesthesia, by ananesthesiologist, versus you
know nothing against anyone inthe profession, but I don't know
.
You know, again, it's thespecialty of how that's being
monitored and that's where thecase goes wrong.
And so you know, if I'm a petowner and I'm like, well, I can
(15:19):
get this monitored instead ofnot, well, yeah, I'll pay the
extra $100 on the $500 deal.
Gianluca (15:28):
Yeah, it's an interesting concept, right?
So some clinics do include usin every estimate they make.
Some other clinics give themthe option.
Some clinics do not give themthe option.
They just put it down, yeah, andit's easy enough, and it also
makes it easier for the vet.
(15:49):
What happens nowadays, the waythat works in most general
practices or small referrals, isthat the veterinarian is
focusing on the surgery, butalso it gets asked all the time,
if anything was wrong with thepet, what to do by the nurse
that's taking care of theanesthesia.
The nurse is looking at themonitor, is watching and is
(16:12):
monitoring, but the veterinariangets, quote unquote, pestered
continuously about hey, doc,this is not.
The blood pressure is low.
Bill (16:27):
What do we do?
Gianluca (16:27):
I'm focusing on the technical aspect of the surgery
right now, not trying to monitorthe vitals Exactly, exactly,
right.
So you know, the servicedoesn't just help the, it helps
the technician to have thatsupport, sure, right, and have
their sole attention on thataspect.
And then it also helps theveterinarian because they can
finally focus on what they dobest, which is the procedure,
(16:52):
you know, and so it takes awaythe stress from them.
It takes away the stress fromthe owner, the technician.
It's less stressed as well.
They love it, they feelempowered, they learn a lot,
right, like when we, when we, wedon't just tell them hey, do
this.
You know, we tell them hey, dothis, because this is what we're
(17:13):
seeing and this is how it works.
So it's also learningopportunity for them and it's a
growth.
It's a growth opportunity forthe nurses as well.
Bill (17:19):
You're just you're.
You're helping level up theentire team by using this
service right, not just gettingthe service itself, but just
being around providing a higherlevel of care.
Gianluca (17:31):
Yeah, that's exactly what we do.
We also offer some you know alot of those clinics.
They want also extra training.
So not only we do cases forthem, we offer both online and
in person.
You know, we have some clinicswhere there is one specifically
in New York where they want usto be there every six months for
a week for training.
They use us every day for cases, but they also want every six
(17:56):
months for a week to be therein-verse, and so actually I'm
flying out in a couple of weeksand I'm going out there.
Bill (18:05):
So let's talk about the process.
Right, so you do the educationpiece, but what does the actual,
you know your integration on acase look like?
To actually remote in and helpwith a case and monitor a case,
what does that look like?
Gianluca (18:23):
It's actually super easy, right.
The clinic gets set up first.
You know, there is no cost.
We don't have a contract,really it's an uppercase basis.
There is zero annual minimum oranything like that, nothing
like that.
We have an initial meeting andwe chat about how their
anesthesia look like at themoment.
We send them a survey wherebasically they fill out like
(18:48):
what drugs they have, whatmonitoring they have and you
know a few other questionsrelated to you know the
anesthetic process that theycurrently do, and then we
basically have a five-minutewalkthrough on, like you know,
how does your anesthesiainduction area look like?
(19:09):
How does your ROAD look like,so that the first time that we
have a case we don't need toworry about you know how things
are set up.
Right, exactly, exactly.
And we know how to help youbecause we know what drugs you
have, what drugs you don't have,what monitoring you have.
You know.
And so we're ready to go fromthe beginning.
And then, when you have a casethat you want to schedule us for
(19:32):
, you just go on our website.
You schedule us for a case andthen the morning of, we already
read all your medical records,you upload that when you
schedule it, and then themorning of you just send us a
picture of your protocol thatyou're using for that specific
path.
We tell you, okay, yeah, thissounds good, or maybe we need to
(19:56):
tweak something on this, basedon what you already have.
And we know what you have.
And then, whenever it's time,you just pull us up, you know on
your phone, you literally loginto our website, the video
starts automatically and we'rethere with you the whole time,
from induction to recovery.
Bill (20:17):
So things go well, everything's fine.
Let's say you're in the middleof a case and you notice
something that is, like you said, going wrong and you need to
catch it before something goeswrong.
How does that process work inthe middle of a case?
Gianluca (20:32):
So it's super easy.
We just tell them.
Just tell them.
You're like hey, look, this iswhat we're seeing on the monitor
.
You know, they they usuallymost people point us use their
phone and they just point it totheir monitor.
Um, we, when we do the setup,we send you a um, a tripod and a
stand for your phone, that it'smagnetic, it also sticks to
(20:54):
metal, so like you can put it onyour anesthesia machine and
whatnot.
And so they just point us tothe monitor and we, we watched
it the whole time.
If we see something, we'll tellyou immediately.
We're like hey, you know, theheart rate is dropping, we need
to give some atropine, forexample, and we give you the
dose and all of that, of course.
And, uh, if they see somethingand you know, example, they have
(21:18):
a question.
Or sometimes, because theypoint us to the monitor, the
surgeon has a better view ofwhat's happening surgery-wise.
If the surgeon sees, forexample, some little bit of
extra bleeding, for example, orsomething like that, they can
just let us know and they'relike hey, doc, you know this dog
(21:39):
is bleeding a little bit more.
Shall we do anything different?
And you know, and that's whenwe give them this suggestion.
So it's a two way conversation.
The whole time you know we'rethere with you.
It's like having one of usright there with you.
Bill (21:50):
So because, like ultimately, ultimately at the
end of the day, and so because,like ultimately, ultimately at
the end of the day, and I don'tknow because I was under
anesthesia when I was having myprocedures and I'm not a medical
professional.
So whatever happens, you knowkind of behind the scenes, but
my guess is, as ananesthesiologist and correct me
if I'm wrong I'm just on here.
You're sitting in theremonitoring.
(22:10):
If you were actually physicallythere, you would be monitoring
the machines and the proceduresthat goes along, and if
something needed to happen, youwould say to the tech administer
a half a milliliter of X, andthen the technician would do
that.
So instead of you physicallybeing in the room, you're there
virtually doing the exact samething that you would be if you
(22:33):
were sitting in the room,exactly doing the exact same
thing that you would be if youwere sitting in the room Exactly
.
Gianluca (22:40):
And consider that usually you know, in our
everyday job, like if I was,like on my physical job, like
where I you know, for example,like Oklahoma State or before
when I was at Ohio State, thereis usually one anesthesiologist
and there is about 10 to 12nurses and we often have 10 to
15 cases asleep at the same time.
Bill (23:03):
So you're bouncing from OR to OR like how's this one doing
?
Okay, they're going to getready to close up over here,
we're going to start wrappingthis up.
So you aren't even in sophysically in person at Ohio
state or Oklahoma state.
When you're monitoring 10 casesat once or five cases at once,
you're not physically in theroom for all those, you're just
bouncing in monitoring them.
Gianluca (23:25):
Exactly this is you bounce by from OR to OR.
You just look at the monitorand it's like, okay, this is
doing, okay, this is doing, okay, this needs help, help.
And so then you, you go in andyou, you tell the nurse, um, or
the technician, you know what towhat to do.
So this is exactly the same.
It's in a smaller scale, um,but, and it's virtual right, so
(23:49):
it's, it's the.
This the exact same thing, isjust that, of course, it's over
the phone, and that's what makesit much more affordable for
these practices that are smallerand they obviously can't afford
one of us full time You've gotto be sitting in there 24-7, 365
.
Bill (24:10):
Or not 24-7, 365.
But just be on staff gettingthat salary.
As you mentioned before, as ayou know, board certified
anesthesiologist, you're in suchhigh demand to say, hey, you
know I need XYZ to be at yourpractice every day while you're
doing procedures.
So you know you're verypassionate about this.
(24:32):
What from a from an animalperspective and transitioning to
this, you know what kind of isdriving you to.
You know you said there'sexpense and, and you know it's
not all about money, but it'salso the kind of the scary part
of being an entrepreneur Kind ofwhat's driving you and your
wife to say that you know wewant to bring this to animal
(24:54):
health across the country andpotentially world well, you know
, um, part of this was realizingthat you know we live.
Gianluca (25:07):
I live 45 minutes to an hour away from where I
actually go from oklahoma state.
Okay, I don't really live indown where the university is.
If something goes wrong with mydog, I need to take him around
here yeah and realizing thatthere is only two
anesthesiologists in the wholestate of Oklahoma.
(25:29):
that's nuts and nobody hasaccess to one of us.
We have zero clinics actuallyin Oklahoma.
We don't service anybody yetaround here.
And that, to me, made merealize even more.
I was like this is crazy, likeif, when I speak with my clients
(25:49):
, like you know, happy New York,in whole New York city, there
is three anesthesiologists andyeah, in long Island there is
zero.
Okay, so like it's, this islike out of this world.
Like you know, a lot ofinstitutions out there they
hoard them right.
Like there is some places likeUC Davis, for example, they have
(26:13):
12 anesthesiologists and NorthCarolina state has nine, right
when, when the total pool is 200or a little bit more, you know,
in some places at 10 or 5 or 6.
Bill (26:27):
80% of them are in academia versus.
You know they're writingprotocols but they're not in the
trenches helping animal healthon a day-to-day basis monitoring
a case when it goes bad, thatyou just can't call up the
professor that you had 15 yearsago at college and say at
(26:47):
veterinary school and say whatshould I do?
Now You're on your own in theOR trying to figure it out.
Gianluca (26:54):
Yeah, it was the idea of, like, trying to expand care
to as many pets as possible.
You know, we can cover way morepets by doing this.
I mean, don't get me wrong, thepeople in academia are doing an
amazing job.
They're great, you know,fantastic, you know.
But that covers the 1%, whichis also the 1% that can afford
(27:15):
this right, like they can afford, you know, the $5,000, $6,000,
$7,000, $10,000 bills that theywill get in a in a referral
place, you know, versus, likethere is a bunch of pets that
can't, or pet owners that can'tafford that, you know, and and
that's why they go to their gps.
And you know, we're not, we'renot trying to steal cases to
(27:39):
anybody like these are pets thatany way they wouldn't go in a
referral, they can't afford it,period.
That's a bunch of cases thatthose places wouldn't see anyway
.
Bill (27:50):
Well then, you're making a financial decision based on
animal health that you might nototherwise have to make if you
can get affordable care at thehighest level from your general
practitioner.
And then back to the strugglesthat veterinarians are having.
Just generally overall you lookat some of the market coming
back down a little bit for someof them down from the high COVID
(28:12):
numbers and the more that theycan keep internally.
You know if they if they canmonitor potentially difficult
case internally versus having torefer that out they're keeping
some of that, rather potentiallybe able to keep some of that
revenue at their practice byoffering you know the service
there versus referring it out.
Gianluca (28:32):
Yeah, no, that's, that's very true.
There is a bunch of pets thatyou know how many times I hear.
You know this owner, it'sreally worried about anesthesia.
Or this pet you know it's alittle bit more complicated it
really needs to go somewherewith an anesthesiologist, but
the owner doesn't have the money.
And what ends up happening isthey could do it at the vet, at
(28:55):
the GP, but they can't affordthe referral.
Or the pet cannot afford towait six months to get to a
referral list right on a waitlist, and what ends up happening
is that the pet doesn't getcare.
Bill (29:06):
Yeah, so who's losing here is the animals, and that's what
made us and the owners, rightlike the owners caring for their
animal, aren't able to make agood decision.
I mean my mom, like I mentionedabout my mom, she I, I know how
much she spent on that Gordonsetter.
She would have spent more than200 bucks on a consultation with
(29:27):
an anesthesiologist before acall.
She would have spent, you know,four figures for sure, uh, based
on uh cause she man, she lovedthat dog and so you know she
knew that there were issues withanesthesia, with that, with her
, with her dog over time and, um, you know the more times they
had to have procedures done andteeth cleanings and this other
(29:48):
stuff, it just every time theywent in it got worse and worse.
And so you know, I just knowfrom my own personal experience
through my mom and her gordonsetter kenzie, um, she
definitely would have, wouldhave made use of this service,
um, and in fact was taking herdog to a referral specialty
center because she felt like shewas able to get a higher level
(30:10):
of care.
Well, in wrapping up, as wetalk about this, what's one kind
of tidbit you would giveveterinarians who are thinking?
One kind of tidbit you wouldgive veterinarians who are
thinking how would this work formy practice, or how would I
offer safer anesthesia or saferpet anesthesia at my practice
and integrate this in?
Gianluca (30:36):
What would that look like To get set up?
It's super easy with us, youknow.
You can just.
You can just go on our websiteor our social media.
You can look up Safe PathAnesthesia on Facebook threads
or Instagram, and we have all ofour links there.
It literally takes a 15 minutesconversation on Zoom.
Bill (30:56):
That's you know so what you're saying is and I'm a big,
again, a big sales guy thenumber one rule in sales is make
it easy for people to give youthe money.
So if you're a veterinarian outthere who wants to offer safe
anesthesia at your practice, youcan do it with Safe Pet
Anesthesia, and I think yourwebsite is safepetanesthesiacom.
(31:17):
It is so we'll have all that inthe show notes.
It is so we'll have all that inthe show notes.
What's one tip or piece ofadvice you would have for a
veterinarian out there who'slooking to become an
entrepreneur and start their ownside hustle slash?
All my eggs are in this basket.
I want this thing to reallywork Business owner.
Gianluca (31:39):
Well, go for it, just jump in it.
Do it.
Just jump in it.
Do it If you, you know you canspend hours and hours and hours
thinking about it.
You can spend hours goingthrough endless pages on Reddit
and trying to figure out how tomake it work and but the best
thing you can do is jump, do it.
(32:02):
And I think you know you'renever going to be sure that it's
going to work.
But if you never try, you'llnever know.
Bill (32:11):
Well, I think what you've got with safe pet anesthesia is
something that can work.
It was very unique.
I liked hearing your story whenwe were at VMX and I'm glad
that you were able to come onthe podcast today and share a
little bit of your story and howyou're bringing Safe Pet
Anesthesia to every veterinarianout there who wants, has got an
internet connection and wantsto use your services.
Gianluca (32:33):
Thank you so much, Bill.
We really appreciate being hereand we're really honored to be
on your podcast.
Thank you for having meAbsolutely Well.
Bill (32:41):
we hope to see you soon and we'll have some information
in the show notes.
But safepananesthesiacom.
Dr Gianluca Bini, I got yourname wrong but I'll get this.
He's a board-certifiedanesthesiologist at Oklahoma
State University as assistantprofessor, entrepreneur and
(33:02):
founder of SafePen Anesthesia.
Thanks for joining us today onthe podcast and, as always to
all of our guests and listenersout there, make sure to like,
share and comment on the podcast.
It will help with the algorithmon the back end and we look
forward to seeing you all soon.
Gianluca (33:19):
Thank you, everybody.
Welcome to the Veterinary Blueprint Podcast brought to you
by Butler Vet Insurance.
Hosted by Bill Butler, theVeterinary Blueprint Podcast is
for veterinarians and practicemanagers who are looking to
learn about working on theirpractice instead of in their
practice.
Each episode we will bring yousuccessful, proven blueprints
from others, both inside andoutside the veterinary industry.
(00:21):
Welcome to today's episode.
Bill (00:30):
Welcome to the Veterinary Blueprints podcast.
I'm your host, bill Butler,bringing you business and
entrepreneurship insights forthe veterinary community.
Today we're joined by a specialguest, dr Gianluca Bini, a
board-certified veterinaryanesthesiologist and founder of
Safe Pet Anesthesia.
He recognized the limitedaccess to specialized anesthesia
(00:52):
care and he launched Safe PetAnesthesia to improve patient
health and educate veterinaryteams.
In addition to leading thisinitiative, which I'm sure takes
a lot of his time, he is anassistant professor teaching on
anesthesiology and painmanagement at Oklahoma State
University.
So let's dive into this journeyand impact of expert anesthesia
care for veterinary medicine.
(01:13):
Welcome, dr Beeney.
Gianluca (01:16):
Thank you, bill.
Thank you for having me, andit's a honor being on your
podcast.
Bill (01:21):
Absolutely so.
We met at VMX.
I was just walking around andyou had a beautiful golden
retriever in your booth on thelast day I believe and I just
was like your dog stopped me inmy tracks and I wanted to say
hello and in fact one of youraisle mates said you should go
talk to Dr Beeney.
He's got a very interestingproduct and a past podcast guest
(01:46):
from Vetland, and so we struckup a conversation.
It kind of went from there.
So why don't you tell you knowI got a little bit of your
background, but why don't youshare for our guests?
You know your start toveterinary medicine and how
things got going for you.
Gianluca (02:21):
Yeah, so I started get into that.
In Europe there are very fewplaces where you can do a
residence in anesthesia, and soas soon as I graduated and moved
to England I did twointernships, one in anesthesia
and the other one is a rotatinginternship.
(02:42):
And then I was alwaysfascinated by the States and the
training that you guys haveover here.
It's, you know, really, reallygood and so I wanted to come
over here for my residency.
I applied and I got into aresidency at North Carolina
State University and then, aftercompleting that, I moved to
(03:05):
Ohio State.
I stayed there for two and ahalf years as an assistant
professor of anesthesia andanalgesia there and then, when I
left there and moving here toOklahoma, I really realized how.
You know how little access theaverage veterinarian has to an
(03:27):
anesthesiologist.
Right, there is only about alittle bit more than 200 of us
in the country which, if youthink about it, so that you know
there's people trained inanesthesia.
Bill (03:38):
you know veterinarians receive training in
anesthesiology, but boardcertified anesthesiologists are
a rarity anesthesiology, butboard certified
anesthesiologists are a rarity.
Gianluca (03:52):
Yeah, it's a really rare species, and so, you know,
most of us are in academia or inhighly specialized referral
centers.
Nobody is, you know, dealingwith GPs, nobody's dealing with
mid to small size referrals, andthat's where most actually most
of the pets get anesthetized,which makes it really, really
sad and it limits their accessto one of us terribly.
And so it was like how do wemake this accessible and
(04:16):
affordable for these pets andthese pet owners?
And that's where the idea camefrom for Self-Pet Anesthesia.
We created a custom builtplatform that allowed us to
follow cases and receive videofeeds from different devices.
Most people use a smartphone andthey literally can just book us
(04:38):
for a case, upload the medicalrecord, scan the protocol that
they want to use.
We give them feedback on thatand then, whenever it's time to
perform the anesthetic event,they just put us on their phone
and we follow the whole casefrom start to finish on video
(04:58):
call.
And we make this superaffordable for them.
And this was the only way ofdoing it was to do it online.
If somebody had to go therephysically, between travel and
all that stuff, you know itwould make it insanely expensive
for the average veterinarian,which is not.
Bill (05:14):
So that's a big jump being an academic, you know, ohio
State University, and then goingto Oklahoma and then saying I'm
going to be an entrepreneur,and your wife was with you.
She's kind of your sidekickbusiness partner.
Probably not your sidekick,you're probably her sidekick,
based on how things.
She's your social media person,dog wrangler, she, she, she
(05:38):
looked like she was taking careof everything down there and you
know.
So I met the both of you and sohow do you sit down?
As you know, if there's anotherveterinarian out there who
wants to seize a need in inanimal, animal health, you know
you going from academic academiato saying I want to open a, you
know, entrepreneur, you knowI'm going to become an
(05:59):
entrepreneur and launch thisbusiness.
What does, what did that looklike?
What was that conversation whenyou went home?
Gianluca (06:06):
Yeah, you know it was scary at first.
You know it's kind of a jumpinto the void.
You know you're used to beingon a salary and now you actually
have to invest money andusually you know FYI for whoever
(06:27):
is listening usually the firstcouple of years you actually
lose money.
Yes, you don't make money.
That was an interesting way ofyou know using our savings
really.
Yeah, you got to be passionate.
Bill (06:42):
Well, and there's a Beyonce quote, and Beyonce, uh,
the Beyonce quote goes like thisI don't often gamble.
When I do, I always bet on me.
And so you know, as anentrepreneur, you're betting on
yourself.
That, uh, you're gonna, you'regonna come out ahead when you're
, when you're making those,those, uh, educated guests,
gambles, I guess.
Gianluca (07:02):
Yeah, it's.
You know I.
I really hope that the gamblepays off.
Um, to be honest, like you know, it's been um, it's been a
journey right.
There's a lot of things thatyou really don't know when you
start a business.
You know, and even the smallthings, right.
You know what hosting platformdo you use for your website.
You know even little thingslike that it's so easy to lose.
(07:26):
You know a grand here and thereand like at the end of the year
, when you actually like go andlook at it, you're like holy
crap, how much money I wasted onstuff that I didn't know, that.
Bill (07:40):
You know I should have done different or whatnot, but
that's a national convention, orjust buying t-shirts or
giveaways to pass on.
I mean, like all those littlethings, like, okay, we're going
to go do a booth at a nationalshow, we have to have some stuff
to give away.
What do we want to give away?
Those are $4 each.
Holy cow.
It's going to cost me, you know, $5,000 just to have this stuff
(08:01):
to give away.
And and so, yeah, I think youknow when you, when you go to
start a business, right, there's, there's all, there's the grand
plan.
It's like this is the endvision, but it's all the small
details, from A to Z.
Gianluca (08:17):
Yeah, the costs rack up super easy.
Right, and providing a service,I think, like this, where it's
unheard of right.
Nobody's doing this in thecountry.
Nobody's doing it for GPs,nobody's doing it for small size
referrals.
(08:38):
You know there is a couple ofpeople that do it for highly
specialized places, but you knowthe difference in pricing is
significant.
You know it's hard because alot of veterinarians don't even
know that you exist, they don'teven know that that's an option,
and so, like it's been hard,like you know, having those
(09:01):
conversations and, and you knowa lot of people assume at the
beginning that what you're doingis just give them a list of
drugs that they can use.
And that's exactly what we donot do.
You know we, we, we give youthat, but we follow your whole
case and that's where the the,the juice is.
You know.
Bill (09:22):
So you know if I'm a veterinarian and you know I want
to practice safe anesthesia inmy practice.
You know what do you think orwhat are your.
You know if you're going togive me some of the safe
practice and you know safe petanesthesia essentials for my
practice.
What are some of those?
Gianluca (09:41):
And, yes, this is what I always tell my students.
Right, I give you the answerthat I give to my students and
some of the clients I have thatyou know.
The very first question theyalways ask is what's your
protocol?
What drugs do we use?
Right, and people get hooked upon that.
But in reality, the true answerthere is that it doesn't matter
(10:05):
.
Right, like the drugs that youuse in 99% of pets, it doesn't
really matter.
What matters is that you knowwhat the drugs do and how to fix
it if something happens.
And so monitoring long story,short monitoring is key.
The patients do not die becauseyou use the wrong drug,
(10:28):
assuming that you stay withinthe normal dose range.
Right, like, of course, if yougive the full bottle of ketamine
, for example.
Of course that's a differentstory.
But if you stay within the doserange, the patient doesn't die
because you picked the wrongdrugs or, you know, if you had a
better protocol, the patientwould have survived.
(10:48):
That's not the case.
The reason why the patient diesis because the monitoring was
lacking, somehow.
Right, there is places outthere and nowadays this is rare,
but you know there is.
There were some places, atleast till a few years ago where
there wasn't any monitoring.
You know there was, they wouldmonitor.
You know, pulse oximetry maybe,and that's about it.
(11:10):
And and you know that's notprobably good practice anymore.
Um, you know, we, we should.
Once you have proper monitoringand you have the know-how on,
you know what's happening.
How can I fix this?
That's how you make it safe.
Bill (11:28):
Fixing something before it gets too bad to fix Too bad.
Gianluca (11:32):
Yeah.
Bill (11:33):
In my non-anesthesia layman terms terms.
So you know I've gone underanesthesia personally a couple
times.
For a couple you knowprocedures I'd broken a leg and
needed a metal plate, my leg.
And you know you go talk to theorthopedic, but when you're,
(11:54):
when you're getting ready to goin, I go speak with the
anesthesiologist before goingunder anesthesia.
And so you know to relate thisto animal health, my mom had a
Gordon Setter that really hadbad reactions to anesthesia and
and so and any sort ofmedication like that, and so in
the vet world, why don't, whyisn't there more consultation
(12:16):
with anesthesiology before aprocedure?
Gianluca (12:21):
Yeah, part of this is again the lack of personnel,
right, like there isn't enoughof us to cover all that side.
Yeah, you know, it's actually avery easy conversation to have
and a lot of owners nowadaysthey are aware.
You know a lot of people gounder anesthesia more and more
often.
A lot of people had oneanesthesia more and more often.
(12:41):
A lot of people had their oneof their family members go under
and they have seen they hadthat experience with
anesthesiologists and they wouldreally love to have that for
their pet.
A lot of the clients want tohave some reassurance around
(13:02):
anesthesia.
You know, when we started thisbusiness we thought that you
know, veterinarians will call usfor very complex cases.
What we found out is that oncewe are out there in that
practice we end up doing, youknow, a lot of spay and neuters,
which are relatively easy cases.
But the reason is that theowners want that.
(13:25):
You know the owners is like ohmy God, you have something like
this, I want it.
I don't care about the extra.
You know $100, $200.
You know they're like you knowI want to have an
anesthesiologist watch after mypet and so it is an option
nowadays.
You know, with a service likeours.
You know we can speak with theclient too, like if you have a
(13:46):
client that would desire to havea chat with us.
We told them to do itbeforehand and after.
You know, I had actually aconversation with one of the
clients from one of the clinicswe followed the other night and
you know the dog was doing okay,but she wanted some extra
reassurance.
She wanted to speak with one ofus and we did so.
(14:07):
It's doable Nowadays.
It is doable.
It wasn't an option until a fewyears ago.
Bill (14:13):
So, as an entrepreneur myself and sales guy 20 plus
years in the sales world, justthinking about what you just
said if I'm a veterinarian it's,you know, $150 to have a
monitoring of anesthesiology andas I'm putting your pet under
that conversation is I'veincluded in the cost of the spay
(14:37):
neuter monitoring ofanesthesiology.
By this, by this, you know this, this, this organization.
However, you position that as apractice owner, right?
if you don't want that, I canremove it, but just include oh
right and then, and then youknow you're, you're including
that service and, as a pet owner, even if I don't have a
(14:58):
conversation with you, I know mypet's being monitored by
anesthesia, by ananesthesiologist, versus you
know nothing against anyone inthe profession, but I don't know
.
You know, again, it's thespecialty of how that's being
monitored and that's where thecase goes wrong.
And so you know, if I'm a petowner and I'm like, well, I can
(15:19):
get this monitored instead ofnot, well, yeah, I'll pay the
extra $100 on the $500 deal.
Gianluca (15:28):
Yeah, it's an interesting concept, right?
So some clinics do include usin every estimate they make.
Some other clinics give themthe option.
Some clinics do not give themthe option.
They just put it down, yeah, andit's easy enough, and it also
makes it easier for the vet.
(15:49):
What happens nowadays, the waythat works in most general
practices or small referrals, isthat the veterinarian is
focusing on the surgery, butalso it gets asked all the time,
if anything was wrong with thepet, what to do by the nurse
that's taking care of theanesthesia.
The nurse is looking at themonitor, is watching and is
(16:12):
monitoring, but the veterinariangets, quote unquote, pestered
continuously about hey, doc,this is not.
The blood pressure is low.
Bill (16:27):
What do we do?
Gianluca (16:27):
I'm focusing on the technical aspect of the surgery
right now, not trying to monitorthe vitals Exactly, exactly,
right.
So you know, the servicedoesn't just help the, it helps
the technician to have thatsupport, sure, right, and have
their sole attention on thataspect.
And then it also helps theveterinarian because they can
finally focus on what they dobest, which is the procedure,
(16:52):
you know, and so it takes awaythe stress from them.
It takes away the stress fromthe owner, the technician.
It's less stressed as well.
They love it, they feelempowered, they learn a lot,
right, like when we, when we, wedon't just tell them hey, do
this.
You know, we tell them hey, dothis, because this is what we're
(17:13):
seeing and this is how it works.
So it's also learningopportunity for them and it's a
growth.
It's a growth opportunity forthe nurses as well.
Bill (17:19):
You're just you're.
You're helping level up theentire team by using this
service right, not just gettingthe service itself, but just
being around providing a higherlevel of care.
Gianluca (17:31):
Yeah, that's exactly what we do.
We also offer some you know alot of those clinics.
They want also extra training.
So not only we do cases forthem, we offer both online and
in person.
You know, we have some clinicswhere there is one specifically
in New York where they want usto be there every six months for
a week for training.
They use us every day for cases, but they also want every six
(17:56):
months for a week to be therein-verse, and so actually I'm
flying out in a couple of weeksand I'm going out there.
Bill (18:05):
So let's talk about the process.
Right, so you do the educationpiece, but what does the actual,
you know your integration on acase look like?
To actually remote in and helpwith a case and monitor a case,
what does that look like?
Gianluca (18:23):
It's actually super easy, right.
The clinic gets set up first.
You know, there is no cost.
We don't have a contract,really it's an uppercase basis.
There is zero annual minimum oranything like that, nothing
like that.
We have an initial meeting andwe chat about how their
anesthesia look like at themoment.
We send them a survey wherebasically they fill out like
(18:48):
what drugs they have, whatmonitoring they have and you
know a few other questionsrelated to you know the
anesthetic process that theycurrently do, and then we
basically have a five-minutewalkthrough on, like you know,
how does your anesthesiainduction area look like?
(19:09):
How does your ROAD look like,so that the first time that we
have a case we don't need toworry about you know how things
are set up.
Right, exactly, exactly.
And we know how to help youbecause we know what drugs you
have, what drugs you don't have,what monitoring you have.
You know.
And so we're ready to go fromthe beginning.
And then, when you have a casethat you want to schedule us for
(19:32):
, you just go on our website.
You schedule us for a case andthen the morning of, we already
read all your medical records,you upload that when you
schedule it, and then themorning of you just send us a
picture of your protocol thatyou're using for that specific
path.
We tell you, okay, yeah, thissounds good, or maybe we need to
(19:56):
tweak something on this, basedon what you already have.
And we know what you have.
And then, whenever it's time,you just pull us up, you know on
your phone, you literally loginto our website, the video
starts automatically and we'rethere with you the whole time,
from induction to recovery.
Bill (20:17):
So things go well, everything's fine.
Let's say you're in the middleof a case and you notice
something that is, like you said, going wrong and you need to
catch it before something goeswrong.
How does that process work inthe middle of a case?
Gianluca (20:32):
So it's super easy.
We just tell them.
Just tell them.
You're like hey, look, this iswhat we're seeing on the monitor
.
You know, they they usuallymost people point us use their
phone and they just point it totheir monitor.
Um, we, when we do the setup,we send you a um, a tripod and a
stand for your phone, that it'smagnetic, it also sticks to
(20:54):
metal, so like you can put it onyour anesthesia machine and
whatnot.
And so they just point us tothe monitor and we, we watched
it the whole time.
If we see something, we'll tellyou immediately.
We're like hey, you know, theheart rate is dropping, we need
to give some atropine, forexample, and we give you the
dose and all of that, of course.
And, uh, if they see somethingand you know, example, they have
(21:18):
a question.
Or sometimes, because theypoint us to the monitor, the
surgeon has a better view ofwhat's happening surgery-wise.
If the surgeon sees, forexample, some little bit of
extra bleeding, for example, orsomething like that, they can
just let us know and they'relike hey, doc, you know this dog
(21:39):
is bleeding a little bit more.
Shall we do anything different?
And you know, and that's whenwe give them this suggestion.
So it's a two way conversation.
The whole time you know we'rethere with you.
It's like having one of usright there with you.
Bill (21:50):
So because, like ultimately, ultimately at the
end of the day, and so because,like ultimately, ultimately at
the end of the day, and I don'tknow because I was under
anesthesia when I was having myprocedures and I'm not a medical
professional.
So whatever happens, you knowkind of behind the scenes, but
my guess is, as ananesthesiologist and correct me
if I'm wrong I'm just on here.
You're sitting in theremonitoring.
(22:10):
If you were actually physicallythere, you would be monitoring
the machines and the proceduresthat goes along, and if
something needed to happen, youwould say to the tech administer
a half a milliliter of X, andthen the technician would do
that.
So instead of you physicallybeing in the room, you're there
virtually doing the exact samething that you would be if you
(22:33):
were sitting in the room,exactly doing the exact same
thing that you would be if youwere sitting in the room Exactly
.
Gianluca (22:40):
And consider that usually you know, in our
everyday job, like if I was,like on my physical job, like
where I you know, for example,like Oklahoma State or before
when I was at Ohio State, thereis usually one anesthesiologist
and there is about 10 to 12nurses and we often have 10 to
15 cases asleep at the same time.
Bill (23:03):
So you're bouncing from OR to OR like how's this one doing
?
Okay, they're going to getready to close up over here,
we're going to start wrappingthis up.
So you aren't even in sophysically in person at Ohio
state or Oklahoma state.
When you're monitoring 10 casesat once or five cases at once,
you're not physically in theroom for all those, you're just
bouncing in monitoring them.
Gianluca (23:25):
Exactly this is you bounce by from OR to OR.
You just look at the monitorand it's like, okay, this is
doing, okay, this is doing, okay, this needs help, help.
And so then you, you go in andyou, you tell the nurse, um, or
the technician, you know what towhat to do.
So this is exactly the same.
It's in a smaller scale, um,but, and it's virtual right, so
(23:49):
it's, it's the.
This the exact same thing, isjust that, of course, it's over
the phone, and that's what makesit much more affordable for
these practices that are smallerand they obviously can't afford
one of us full time You've gotto be sitting in there 24-7, 365
.
Bill (24:10):
Or not 24-7, 365.
But just be on staff gettingthat salary.
As you mentioned before, as ayou know, board certified
anesthesiologist, you're in suchhigh demand to say, hey, you
know I need XYZ to be at yourpractice every day while you're
doing procedures.
So you know you're verypassionate about this.
(24:32):
What from a from an animalperspective and transitioning to
this, you know what kind of isdriving you to.
You know you said there'sexpense and, and you know it's
not all about money, but it'salso the kind of the scary part
of being an entrepreneur Kind ofwhat's driving you and your
wife to say that you know wewant to bring this to animal
(24:54):
health across the country andpotentially world well, you know
, um, part of this was realizingthat you know we live.
Gianluca (25:07):
I live 45 minutes to an hour away from where I
actually go from oklahoma state.
Okay, I don't really live indown where the university is.
If something goes wrong with mydog, I need to take him around
here yeah and realizing thatthere is only two
anesthesiologists in the wholestate of Oklahoma.
(25:29):
that's nuts and nobody hasaccess to one of us.
We have zero clinics actuallyin Oklahoma.
We don't service anybody yetaround here.
And that, to me, made merealize even more.
I was like this is crazy, likeif, when I speak with my clients
(25:49):
, like you know, happy New York,in whole New York city, there
is three anesthesiologists andyeah, in long Island there is
zero.
Okay, so like it's, this islike out of this world.
Like you know, a lot ofinstitutions out there they
hoard them right.
Like there is some places likeUC Davis, for example, they have
(26:13):
12 anesthesiologists and NorthCarolina state has nine, right
when, when the total pool is 200or a little bit more, you know,
in some places at 10 or 5 or 6.
Bill (26:27):
80% of them are in academia versus.
You know they're writingprotocols but they're not in the
trenches helping animal healthon a day-to-day basis monitoring
a case when it goes bad, thatyou just can't call up the
professor that you had 15 yearsago at college and say at
(26:47):
veterinary school and say whatshould I do?
Now You're on your own in theOR trying to figure it out.
Gianluca (26:54):
Yeah, it was the idea of, like, trying to expand care
to as many pets as possible.
You know, we can cover way morepets by doing this.
I mean, don't get me wrong, thepeople in academia are doing an
amazing job.
They're great, you know,fantastic, you know.
But that covers the 1%, whichis also the 1% that can afford
(27:15):
this right, like they can afford, you know, the $5,000, $6,000,
$7,000, $10,000 bills that theywill get in a in a referral
place, you know, versus, likethere is a bunch of pets that
can't, or pet owners that can'tafford that, you know, and and
that's why they go to their gps.
And you know, we're not, we'renot trying to steal cases to
(27:39):
anybody like these are pets thatany way they wouldn't go in a
referral, they can't afford it,period.
That's a bunch of cases thatthose places wouldn't see anyway
.
Bill (27:50):
Well then, you're making a financial decision based on
animal health that you might nototherwise have to make if you
can get affordable care at thehighest level from your general
practitioner.
And then back to the strugglesthat veterinarians are having.
Just generally overall you lookat some of the market coming
back down a little bit for someof them down from the high COVID
(28:12):
numbers and the more that theycan keep internally.
You know if they if they canmonitor potentially difficult
case internally versus having torefer that out they're keeping
some of that, rather potentiallybe able to keep some of that
revenue at their practice byoffering you know the service
there versus referring it out.
Gianluca (28:32):
Yeah, no, that's, that's very true.
There is a bunch of pets thatyou know how many times I hear.
You know this owner, it'sreally worried about anesthesia.
Or this pet you know it's alittle bit more complicated it
really needs to go somewherewith an anesthesiologist, but
the owner doesn't have the money.
And what ends up happening isthey could do it at the vet, at
(28:55):
the GP, but they can't affordthe referral.
Or the pet cannot afford towait six months to get to a
referral list right on a waitlist, and what ends up happening
is that the pet doesn't getcare.
Bill (29:06):
Yeah, so who's losing here is the animals, and that's what
made us and the owners, rightlike the owners caring for their
animal, aren't able to make agood decision.
I mean my mom, like I mentionedabout my mom, she I, I know how
much she spent on that Gordonsetter.
She would have spent more than200 bucks on a consultation with
(29:27):
an anesthesiologist before acall.
She would have spent, you know,four figures for sure, uh, based
on uh cause she man, she lovedthat dog and so you know she
knew that there were issues withanesthesia, with that, with her
, with her dog over time and, um, you know the more times they
had to have procedures done andteeth cleanings and this other
(29:48):
stuff, it just every time theywent in it got worse and worse.
And so you know, I just knowfrom my own personal experience
through my mom and her gordonsetter kenzie, um, she
definitely would have, wouldhave made use of this service,
um, and in fact was taking herdog to a referral specialty
center because she felt like shewas able to get a higher level
(30:10):
of care.
Well, in wrapping up, as wetalk about this, what's one kind
of tidbit you would giveveterinarians who are thinking?
One kind of tidbit you wouldgive veterinarians who are
thinking how would this work formy practice, or how would I
offer safer anesthesia or saferpet anesthesia at my practice
and integrate this in?
Gianluca (30:36):
What would that look like To get set up?
It's super easy with us, youknow.
You can just.
You can just go on our websiteor our social media.
You can look up Safe PathAnesthesia on Facebook threads
or Instagram, and we have all ofour links there.
It literally takes a 15 minutesconversation on Zoom.
Bill (30:56):
That's you know so what you're saying is and I'm a big,
again, a big sales guy thenumber one rule in sales is make
it easy for people to give youthe money.
So if you're a veterinarian outthere who wants to offer safe
anesthesia at your practice, youcan do it with Safe Pet
Anesthesia, and I think yourwebsite is safepetanesthesiacom.
(31:17):
It is so we'll have all that inthe show notes.
It is so we'll have all that inthe show notes.
What's one tip or piece ofadvice you would have for a
veterinarian out there who'slooking to become an
entrepreneur and start their ownside hustle slash?
All my eggs are in this basket.
I want this thing to reallywork Business owner.
Gianluca (31:39):
Well, go for it, just jump in it.
Do it.
Just jump in it.
Do it If you, you know you canspend hours and hours and hours
thinking about it.
You can spend hours goingthrough endless pages on Reddit
and trying to figure out how tomake it work and but the best
thing you can do is jump, do it.
(32:02):
And I think you know you'renever going to be sure that it's
going to work.
But if you never try, you'llnever know.
Bill (32:11):
Well, I think what you've got with safe pet anesthesia is
something that can work.
It was very unique.
I liked hearing your story whenwe were at VMX and I'm glad
that you were able to come onthe podcast today and share a
little bit of your story and howyou're bringing Safe Pet
Anesthesia to every veterinarianout there who wants, has got an
internet connection and wantsto use your services.
Gianluca (32:33):
Thank you so much, Bill.
We really appreciate being hereand we're really honored to be
on your podcast.
Thank you for having meAbsolutely Well.
Bill (32:41):
we hope to see you soon and we'll have some information
in the show notes.
But safepananesthesiacom.
Dr Gianluca Bini, I got yourname wrong but I'll get this.
He's a board-certifiedanesthesiologist at Oklahoma
State University as assistantprofessor, entrepreneur and
(33:02):
founder of SafePen Anesthesia.
Thanks for joining us today onthe podcast and, as always to
all of our guests and listenersout there, make sure to like,
share and comment on the podcast.
It will help with the algorithmon the back end and we look
forward to seeing you all soon.
Gianluca (33:19):
Thank you, everybody.
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