OUR STORY

Established in 1952, by Dr. Raymond (Doc) Hanson, the clinic began as a country practice treating all creatures great and small. At the time, it was named Chisago Lakes Veterinary Hospital. In 1987, Dr. Pete joined Doc after being drawn to the beautiful lakes area. Dr. Pete was a Merit Scholar and could have entered any medical field, but chose veterinary medicine because he felt a special calling to help animals. He always felt that animals had similar emotions to humans but they communicated through different means. Right or wrong, he always felt he understood them a little better than most. In 1991 Dr. Pete purchased the practice when Doc retired. Dr. Pete then began to focus on family pets and pursued his interest in surgery. He sought additional training and even flew an industry-leading surgeon to Lindstrom for private training.

In 2002, the business name was changed to Lakes Veterinary & Surgical Center to better reflect key capabilities and the broader lakes community being served. We are now blessed to have 3 experienced doctors and their associated support teams. We see patients for routine services like vaccines, spays, neuters, and complex surgeries like ruptured cruciate ligament knee repairs, fracture repairs, oral surgeries, and difficult tumor removals. We also see patients that are referred by other clinics. Although our building is small, we’ve invested heavily in technology. We have a complete in-house lab that allows test results to be available during your appointment and the same day as surgery. Like human medicine, we utilize digital dental and body radiology, video scopes, and electronic monitoring during surgery, to name a few. Dr. Pete is a big believer in regenerative medicine so we offer PRP (Platelet Rich Plasma) therapy and therapeutic laser therapy. Dr. Pete is also passionate about proper pain management before and after surgery. He invests in drugs and protocols that are similar to human medicine.

Going forward, our goal is to remain a lower volume clinic that provides a higher level of personalized care and unique services. We’ve worked hard to build a reputation that attracts clients from our own community, other states (California, Wisconsin, Michigan) and other parts of the metro (Hibbing, Edina, Medina, Woodbury, Stillwater, to name a few). We are also planning to maintain private family ownership. We believe that owners that live in the community, provide a higher level of care and support to the community they serve.