Does your pet know your vet? There are some pet owners who acquaint their animal to one vet. This yields positive psychological dividends on the part of the pet as stress levels decrease on encountering a familiar face. Dogs have a keen memory as I observed recently. I had changed location for quite some time and was surprised to see that a young dog in our homestead could easily and readily recognize me. I could also appreciate its emotional healing on seeing me. I think its a good thing to familiarize your dog to one practitioner for easier and more pleasant veterinary experience. Dogs are naturally cautious of strangers and keep to themselves. They should be able to recognise the vet as a member of the family. In any case, the same vet would have a good medical history of the pet and would likely be soft on your pockets and even offer some services for free.
We have 2 vets - a male vet who does house calls and a female vet in the animal clinic. All our 3 dogs know the 2 vets because they alternate in the checkup. But the male vet is more oriented with our dogs because he is often that is called. Tisoy and Barbie, our white dogs, are behaved with the male vet but Pipoy, our hyperactive pug, is angry with the vet. However, if we would bring Pipoy to the male vet's clinic, he would behave. With the female vet, our 3 dogs are friendly maybe because the female vet is always in the clinic and it is her territory, the dogs know it probably.
Our problem with Pipoy is his nails, he hates even to see a nail cutter. It's only in the clinic where they are able to trim Pipoy's nails.