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Keil

Photo by John Wogan

Photographs on the wall at Erdman Animal Hospital document moments in the clinic's 69-year history. Dr. Lance Keil points to a picture shot in 1987, the year he graduated from the University of Pennsylvania's veterinary school. The photo shows him with his father, who founded the clinic, and his daughter.

Three hundred and thirty-six people commented after Dr. Lance Keil posted on social media that his veterinary clinic — the one his father started in 1957 on Erdman Avenue in Baltimore — was closing.

"I'm literally in tears," said one. "You have been a blessing to this community," wrote another. "We couldn't ask for a better doctor for our fur kids!" a third exclaimed. "Not to mention how you managed to give the best care while keeping it affordable. You will be missed!"

At age 65, with three granddaughters he wants to spend more time with and property on Maryland's Eastern Shore and a cattle ranch to tend, Keil has plenty of plans for retirement. But the decision to shutter his veterinary practice was bittersweet. "All those people," he said in an interview, referring to the pet owners left to look elsewhere for care. "I mean, that neighborhood, just up the street, just had a CVS [pharmacy] close. Baltimore has a little bit of an issue with businesses leaving."

Keil didn't plan to leave this way. He thought that when he retired, the practice would carry on with a new owner. "Despite my best efforts," he wrote on Facebook, "I have been unable to find a permanent replacement, as the veterinary field has changed considerably in recent years."

Case in point: As Keil was considering closing up shop, his one full-time associate received a job offer from a corporate practice group at a salary that Keil couldn't begin to match. "With his bonuses, he'll probably make twice what I was paying him, and that's more than I was making as an owner" — minus the stress of ownership, Keil said.

As the cost of living escalates, it's ever harder to keep business expenses down enough to maintain the low prices that the independent hospital is known for.

'A good enough living'

Erdman Animal Hospital, named for the street where it's located, was founded by Dr. John Keil 69 years ago. Thirty years later, his son, Lance, graduated from veterinary school and joined him at the clinic. At the time, they charged $10 for an exam. Today, the price is $52, which is on the low end for a regular appointment. According to 2024 data from CareCredit, a healthcare financing brand, the national average cost for a routine veterinary visit ranges from $70 to $174 for dogs and $53 to $124 for cats.

"Fifty-two is probably a little bit on the low side," Keil allowed, "but not too bad. We do charge an urgent care fee of $72."

He added, by way of explanation, "I sort of always felt like I made a good enough living. I didn't need to raise my prices."

The clinic is located in what Keil describes as a blue-collar neighborhood. Posts from clients on its Facebook page testify to the compassion of its staff and its affordability.

"This is the cheapest place in Baltimore city," one woman told a local television station, WMAR, in a segment about the practice closing. Keil was great at accommodating people, she said, whatever their means. "Surgeries, he'll work it out," she said. "Payment plan? He's got you."

Out of sync

Keil took over as owner of the practice in 1990. A father of three, he, too, has a son who is a veterinarian. Perhaps the practice could have passed to a third generation, but the timing didn't line up. When, in the early 2020s, Keil began thinking about selling, his son Eric Keil was considering moving out of state. Ultimately, the younger Keil ended up staying in Maryland, but he took another path, starting a relief and mobile surgery business and later purchasing and running his own clinic.

All the same, Eric Keil said by email, Erdman "has been a huge part of my life for as long as I can remember. I was there as a child folding laundry for $5 an hour before cleaning kennels, then running rooms and eventually performing technician duties before going to veterinary school.

"My father and Erdman Animal Hospital have truly been a pillar of that community," he continued. "... I've had strangers stop me on the street or while out socially after hearing where I worked, and almost everyone has a story about how much they appreciated the care he provided to their pets over the years."

At the time that Lance Keil was pondering an exit plan, veterinary practice had become a hot investment, drawing private equity funding that brought many formerly independent practices under consolidated ownership.

"The corporations were basically going crazy trying to buy as many hospitals as they could," Keil said, "so the time was really perfect to sell it."

Erdman_exterior

Photo by John Wogan

Erdman Animal Hospital has become an institution in its northeast Baltimore neighborhood. The shingle over the door still sports the name of the man who founded it 69 years ago, Dr. John Keil, along with the name of its current owner.

He nearly did. Working through a broker, Keil got an offer from a consolidator. He accepted tentatively. But when it came to terms, buyer and seller differed on several points. The deal-breaker had to do with health insurance for one of Keil's sons, an adult with a learning disability. The plan was that Keil would remain at the practice for three years. Keil hoped that during that time, he could obtain health coverage for his son through the new owner. But the would-be owner balked.

"That was probably the deciding factor," Keil recounted. "I was like, they're not bringing me on as a, you know, loving partner."

Keil hired another broker and tried again. But, he said, he's received no further serious inquiries.

Not the right time to own

Sometimes at independent practices, an associate will take over when the owner retires. Keil's full-time associate, Dr. Muhib Sahibzada, however, said the time is not right for him to own a practice. Sahibzada is 37 and has years of experience working as an international public health veterinarian, having earned a veterinary degree at the University of Agriculture Faisalabad in Pakistan. But he has been practicing clinical medicine in the United States for only a year and a half.

Sahibzada immigrated to the U.S. in 2017. He wasn't qualified at the time to obtain a license to practice in the country because his school did not have U.S. accreditation. In search of work in the veterinary field, Sahibzada was referred to Keil as someone known to help foreign veterinarians. They hit it off, and Keil hired him as support staff. Eventually, Sahibzada earned a veterinary license after completing what's known as the Program for the Assessment of Veterinary Education Equivalence, or PAVE.


That was in late 2024. Sahibzada said jobs for veterinarians were abundant, but he opted to return to Erdman Animal Hospital, unconcerned about pay. "I started in this community, and it's my time to give back to the community," he said.

However, the spiraling cost of living during the past year and a half has been difficult to manage, he said. He supplements his income by taking relief shifts at other hospitals, resulting in a seven-day work week. On top of that, he commutes 80 miles round trip between Baltimore and Washington, D.C. It's been exhausting; Sahibzada said he worried about burning out. So when he was offered a better-paying job at a practice alongside multiple other doctors in Washington, D.C., shaving his commute to relatively nothing, the decision to move on was a no-brainer.

Keil cattle

Photo courtesy of Dr. Lance Keil

Besides his veterinary clinic, Keil has a ranch with 40 cows and two bulls.

Keil could have tried to find another full-time associate, but that struck him as futile. "No, because I'm going to be training them, and then at the end of the year, they're going to get an offer similar to what he got, and I just spent another year of my life training somebody," he said, "and then I'm going to be put right back in the same situation. You know?"

In addition to Sahibzada and Keil, Erdman Animal Hospital has a third veterinarian, Dr. Wai-Hong "William" Wu, who works there part-time. Much as Wu wants to see the hospital stay open, he said that his disposition isn't suited to ownership. "I'm not very good at management. I'm not very good at money," he said.

Moreover, like Sahibzada, Wu is relatively new to practice in the U.S. For 30 years, Wu worked in microbiology and disease research. He obtained a veterinary license in the U.S. in 2017 and joined Erdman two years later, splitting his time between the independent clinic and one belonging to a large corporation. During this time, Wu said, he has focused on gaining general-practice clinical skills and knowledge. Furthermore, he's nearly Keil's age — too far along in his career, perhaps, to take on the rigors of owning a business.

Talking about what might have been, Keil muses that if he'd taken the consolidator's offer in 2021, he'd have been retired for almost two years already. He hastens to say that he doesn't regret letting go of that chance to sell the business. "I didn't see that as my retirement fund ... and I'm certainly not going to be poor, by any extent," he said.

And, he thinks, who knows? The practice will be open through May 28. Maybe a suitable new owner will surface by then.