---
name: al-514-give-your-front-desk-an-ai-checklist-for-sick-pet-or-urge
description: "A co-owner of Paoli Vetcare, a vet hospital in Paoli, Pennsylvania, who has no coding background, built veTriage with OpenAI tools. The app helps receptionists handle sick-pet phone calls. It walks staff through the right history questions, flags urgent warning signs and routes each case for a vet to review. It does not ask front-desk staff to diagnose, and it keeps how urgent a case is separate from which appointments are free. OpenAI named it first place in the Work & Productivity category of its Build Week in August 2026. It is being piloted at the clinic, and no time or money results are given yet. A vet must decide every medical question. The same pattern works for any business where some calls are urgent. Use when the user wants help with call triage (customer support) for a small business."
---

# Give your front desk an AI checklist for sick-pet (or urgent customer) calls: it asks the right history questions in order, flags red-flag answers as URGENT, and sends the case to a vet, never diagnosing and never letting open appointment slots decide urgency

A co-owner of Paoli Vetcare, a vet hospital in Paoli, Pennsylvania, who has no coding background, built veTriage with OpenAI tools. The app helps receptionists handle sick-pet phone calls. It walks staff through the right history questions, flags urgent warning signs and routes each case for a vet to review. It does not ask front-desk staff to diagnose, and it keeps how urgent a case is separate from which appointments are free. OpenAI named it first place in the Work & Productivity category of its Build Week in August 2026. It is being piloted at the clinic, and no time or money results are given yet. A vet must decide every medical question. The same pattern works for any business where some calls are urgent.

## Inputs to collect first
Ask the user for anything below that they haven't already given you. Don't guess missing facts.

- Clinic/business
- Sick-pet
- Species and age, main problem, when it started, eating and drinking…
- Trouble breathing, bloat, a seizure or a toxin
- Your own material (text, notes or data)

## Instructions

Do the task below with the user's inputs in place of each [bracket].

1. Write down how your best staff handle urgent calls at [clinic/business]: the questions, the warning signs and who decides.
2. Say: "You help the front desk take a [sick-pet] call. Ask one at a time: [species and age, main problem, when it started, eating and drinking, vomiting, breathing, possible toxins]."
3. Add: "If the caller reports [trouble breathing, bloat, a seizure or a toxin], say URGENT and tell staff to get a [vet] now."
4. Add: "Never diagnose. Decide urgency first, before you look at open appointments."
5. Have it write a short case summary for the [vet] to review.
6. Pilot it with receptionists, techs, the manager and a [vet] before using it on every call.
Safety: staff read the answers out and a professional makes every medical decision; when in doubt, treat it as urgent.

## Safety checks (share these with the user)

- Remove names, contact details, account numbers and other personal data the task doesn't need before you paste, and check your AI tool's data and training settings.
- Read and edit the draft before it reaches a customer or goes public. If you later automate this prompt, start with "draft and notify me", not "send automatically".
- Check names, dates, numbers and any claim against your own source material before you use the answer. AI can misread or invent details.
- Say clearly which parts need a person to review or approve before anything is sent, paid, posted or filed.

## About this skill

- Works with: ChatGPT, OpenAI API, veTriage
- Based on this real-world example: https://smallbizagentusecases.com/use-cases/vet-owner-builds-ai-triage-for-sick-pet-calls/
- Free prompt from AgentPlaybook Real Estate: https://agentic-library.netlify.app/prompt/al-514-give-your-front-desk-an-ai-checklist-for-sick-pet-or-urgent/
- To install in an agent that supports Agent Skills, save this file as SKILL.md in a folder with the same name as `name` above (for example in your skills directory). Install steps for Claude.ai, Claude Code, Cursor and Codex: https://agentic-library.netlify.app/skills/