Visit decline slows as patterns for care continue to shift
New data show nonwellness visits increasing as wellness and surgical visits fall
By Christine Won
A general downward trend in patient visits continued in 2026 but revenue improved slightly year-over-year as more pet owners sought veterinary care for their sick animals.
As a K-shaped wealth gap continues to diverge, with the top quartile of patients increasingly carrying a growing share of practice revenue, experts highlighted data that veterinary practices can act on at the 2026 AVMA Veterinary Business and Economic Forum, held virtually October 7-8.
“With patient visits remaining on the decline, clinics must be creative in how to grow their revenue while also staying competitive,” said Andrea Ferguson, a registered veterinary technician and senior national account manager of data services at Vetsource. “It’s important clinics remember clients remain price conscious and may price shop whenever possible.”
During the Practice Pulse session on October 7, Ferguson shared aggregated findings from the Vetsource data, derived from direct practice information management systems integrations with approximately 6,000 veterinary practices across the U.S. The data reflects in-hospital transactions between summer 2025 and summer 2026 and includes predominantly general practices, with about 45% corporate owned and 55% independent.
A widening gap
The top quartile of patients brought in about three-fifths of practice revenue (62%) in those 12 months, as the gap between revenue generated by that group and the bottom 75% has grown more over the past three years.
The top quartile of patients, on average, also represented 52% of visits, Ferguson said.
In addition to driving practice revenue with higher revenue per visit ($220), the top quartile also represented greater visits per patient (7.6), and fewer days between visits (44). Comparatively, the bottom 75% of patients’ days between visits grew longer to 230, Ferguson said.
Ferguson said a significant factor in veterinary practice performance is household income dynamics, which includes what a household is willing to do for their pet, regardless of its disposable income.
Data showed practices in lower-income areas had the highest rate of lapsing patients—those with no transactions in more than 14 months—while those in the highest income areas had the lowest rate of lapsing patients.
A similar correlation was observed in bonding rates, defined as the percentage of new patients that return for a second visit within 18 months of their first visit.
For clients with a median household income of less than $75,000, only 8% had the highest bonding rate (76% to 100%), compared with 53% of those with a median household income exceeding $150,000.
AVMA Chief Economist Katelyn McCullock said she expects wealth gaps to persist among generations, which means averages aren’t telling the whole story.
“Now, veterinary clinics might already feel those disparities in their own microclimate and may struggle to fit all needs of all the population around them,” she added. “That’s where market differentiation will continue to diverge across business models to match those different customers and preferences.”
Revenue and visits
Overall, veterinary visits declined by 1.1% year-over-year, on average, while overall revenue increased by 3.4% in that time, Ferguson said.
Over the past four years, wellness, surgery, and product-only visits have declined, while nonwellness visits have trended positively.
Between July 2025 and June 2026, nonwellness visits rose by 2.1%, while wellness (-3.0%), surgery (-5.0%), and product-only (-5.0%) visits declined.
“So this year, we continue to speculate that owners are willing to bring their pet into the [veterinarian] when they believe it is in need of medical attention,” Ferguson said.
She suggested that owners may be pushing off vaccines and nonemergency surgeries, including dentals and lump removals. It may also be that some wellness care is going to vaccination events outside of the clinic, and surgeries are being referred out to surgical and referral centers.
“When this happens, we lose visibility to those visits,” she said, explaining the Vetsource data may not tell the full story.
Ferguson also presented data on the net change in total patients.
The average practice saw a net loss of 326 patients despite adding an average of 1,214 new patients per practice in the past 12 months. This was a slight improvement compared with a net loss of 368 patients per practice, on average, during the period 12 to 24 months prior, despite seeing an average of 1,244 new patients per practice.
Some of the decrease in patients, she said, was driven by the decline of new puppies and kittens, which typically make up 10% of the patient base. Those visits are down by 12.0% and 2.1%, respectively, year-over-year.
Veterinarian density
Another factor that influences practice growth, Ferguson said, is the number of veterinarians in a practice.
Those with very high visit growth had the highest increase in veterinarians per practice (5.5%) and the lowest decline in daily appointments per veterinarian (-0.1%), as well as a slight increase in daily veterinary technician appointments (0.3%).
In addition, practices with very low lapsing rates had the highest increase in veterinarian per practice, Ferguson said. Data also showed a slight increase in daily appointments per veterinarian.
“With more DVMs, we can speculate clients may experience more accessibility to appointment times when calling to schedule, leading to lower lapsing rates and less patient churn,” Ferguson said.
McCullock encouraged veterinary practices to investigate their individual visit-category performance, patient-churn data, and retention trends.
“The normal way of doing business may need to change to stay competitive, now that this declining visit era has continued to persist,” McCullock said. “It’s recommended that clinics really explore and learn their individual customer categories so they can focus on different performance metrics and learn some of the nuances of how to bring specific patients back through their clinic doors, as well as take care of those that are more actively coming in and can encourage better bonding to the practice in general.”
For more practical advice from the Practice Pulse session at the 2026 AVMA Veterinary Business and Economic Forum, download the 3-2-1 Insight-to-Action Guide.
Those interested in veterinary economic updates can also sign up to receive AVMA Practice Pulse, a monthly digest of key economic intelligence, practice data, trends, and expert insights. Practice Pulse leverages benchmarked data from thousands of veterinary practices, through a partnership between AVMA and Vetsource.
Fonte: https://www.avma.org/
