"One way to make sure your vet is up on the latest stuff? Ask what medications he uses for anesthesia. If he says he uses ketamine or halothane gas, that's not good. That's like 1970s medicine. Isoflurane and sevoflourane are alot safer."
There are many variations in how vets practice medicine. We all are trained by professors with biases, and trained with the most up to date information available, but information and biases change with time. We are required to attend continuing education classes yearly, but no-one tells us what information we must be trained on.
The point? Most of us see standards of practice as a moving target- we are constantly re-evaluating how we do things- from exam and diagnosis to treatment and surgery. I think the way we each end up practicing veterinary medicine as an amalgamation of all that we have seen, done, and been taught. We take a bit from all of those who influence us and combine it into our own way of doing things.
Having said that, I use ketamine. In combinations with other medications, it gives cats a wonderful plane of anesthesia for many procedures. I also use propofol, which is considered pretty modern anesthesia. I have used both isoflurane and sevo in practice. I have worked in places with halothane.
I'm not sure grilling your vet on anesthetic protocols is the best way to evaluate the "modernity" of a practice. I'm not sure there is a good way to evaluate how modern a practice's medicine is. One way might be to look for American Animal Hospital Association (AAHA) certified practices. These are vet hospitals that undergo a voluntary evaluation by AAHA, and are shown to meet criteria set up to evaluate the medicine, surgery, and management of the hospital. The evaluation might not be a guarantee of good medicine, but I think the motivation involved in getting certified indicates a motivation to stay up to date in other areas.
Enjoy your pets!
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