I have wondered this since I was a small kid. Hypothetically (I’m not suggesting anyone strapped for cash do this 
), could a veterinary treat a human being for illness? Think about it. Sure it’s not what they are “supposed” to do. But on the other hand, a human is just another kind of animal isn’t he/she? 
A bit of a guess:
Yes.
I’ve heard that a surprising number of doctors are vetinary school dropouts. It’s harder to learn to treat 100 species than just one.
I wouldn’t want a vet if I could help it, though, because his training is not in humans. There’s a lot of understanding of animal biology, but not much in the dosages and side effects in humans, and the finer points of human anatomy.
Better answers will probably follow.
Treat in what sense? In the case of an emergency, between a vet and a plumber, I’d want the vet to help me – but for ongoing treatment, esp. for a chronic condition, I’d absolutely want a physician.
Could a veterinary surgeon treat a human being for illness? Yes. Hell, anybody can treat a human being for illness. The more interesting questions are (1) could a veterinary surgeon legally treat a human being for illness, and (2) could a veterinary surgeon treat a human being for illness as effectively as a doctor could?
Legally, a veterinary surgeon can offer the same advice or treatment that any lay person can, I guess. If he goes beyond that and holds himself out as practising human medicine, or charges for his advice or treatment, or does something that normally only a qualified doctor would do, then in most if not all countries he’s in the same place that a lay person would be; deep trouble. He’s practising medicine without a licence. The fact that he has a veterinary qualification will be no defence.
In practical terms. vets can presumably offer better advice or treatment than wholly unqualified lay people. They will have a better understanding of physiology, disease and other relevant factors, but presumably not as good an understanding of human physiology, human disease, etc, as a doctor would have. There will be areas of medical practice where they have no experience at all (e.g. how to take a patient’s history and how to assess it) and of course human medicine is practised in an entirely different ethical framework, which vets will have had no training or professional formation in.
My guess is it would be illegal, but done occasionally. I’ve been in line behind a vet at the drugstore and watched him write out a prescription for himself for some antibiotics. He spoke rather loudly to the pharmacist about it, including that it was for him.
Also, a vet it my town got into some serious trouble when it turned out he had been writing one of his employees prescriptions for Vicodin which she had been filling at different drugstores in several towns. This came to light after she was found dead.
I’m guessing this is usually a Bad Idea.
OH, yeah, I ANAD, pharmacist, vet or anything else helpful.
If I needed stitches or a broken bone set or some bandages, you’re damn right a vet would come in handy. If I had heartworm or fleas, I’d proabably rush over there ASAP.
If I needed my prostate checked, or some insulin or fertility testing, I’d wait for the people doc. Oh, I’d let a vet pull a tooth or 2 if it was Saturday night on a long weekend.
Otherwise, I’d see a people dentist. Our vet is great. With our cats. Vets DO know a helluva lot about medical things. I’m probably just a little bit bitter about that time that I went in to be neutered and came out declawed.
YMMV
Sure. Of course, if you break your leg a vet would have you shot, but …
If you had an ordinary illness, a doctor is best. However, in an emergency, you’re often better off with a vet (unless the doc on hand is an ER doc). Why? Because under the bonnet humans and animals are pretty much the same, with minor tweaks between species. We learn human physiology and anatomy at vet school. We do heaps of surgery every day, often involving critical care following trauma. Most GP’s in human medicine don’t get to deal with proper emergency work ever, let alone on a daily basis. In addition, I don’t need you to talk to me, since my patients never do. So it doesn’t matter if you don’t speak English, or are otherwise unable to communicate.
For vets, humans are just another species to learn, which we could cram in 6 months if we did it full time, or a year or so if it was just added to our degree. I think in the UK you can do a one year conversion course to go from vet to doctor after graduation.
Also, vets do EVERYTHING for animals; we do our own anaesthetics, radiology, pathology, blood analysis, surgery, obstetrics, dentistry, opthalmology, etc etc, where as most doctors either sit in a consult room, or are highly specialised. That would bore me stupid, to be honest, which is why I chose veterinary science over medicine.
Are vets qualified to treat zombies, too?
Well, I allowed a friend (who is an Economics professor and skydiver) stitch up my busted elbow after a really drunken fall in the rain. 
(I was anesthetized with several shots of vodka, he scrubbed in and out properly, and used nylon parachute thread. And even took the stitches back out a week or so later.)
My former vet practiced acupuncture on my dogs. I had some minor ache/pain one time when I was in there with the dog and he gave me a bit of acupuncture as well. He did it on himself and was certified to work on people as well as critters – in terms of acupuncture.
I have always had a huge amount of respect for veterinarians precisely because they are not just really diverse animal doctors, having to know about many different species, but also because they are surgeons, oncologists, geriatric specialists, orthopedic specialists, internists, cardiologists, nephrologists, and neurologists. They know about all the systems and usually can do surgery as adeptly as diagnoses. Human doctors tend to specialize and even GPs will refer you to a specialist when they get in over their head on a given body system or disease process. Vets do it all.
So, I probably wouldn’t trust a vet to treat me for cancer, but emergency stitches or setting a broken bone or something? Sure, I would totally trust a vet to do that, given a human doctor was unavailable, ethical and legal considerations are thrown out because I’m talking about an emergency situation. I’m not gonna hop up on the table and ask the vet for a Pap smear next time I take the dog in for her rabies shot.
if they are animal zombies sure.
i would extend the above discussion to include human zombies in an emergency, which could in fact be legal depending on laws allowing people to give emergency care.
We had this discussion at work once. In the event of an emergency and you had something like appendicitis would you let a vet treat you?
I said yes.
so … Houses little crew of docs are vets?
I would, too.
Don’t take the doggie medicine, though. Your coughing will be interpreted as a dog bark.
a former co-worker’s dad is a vet and he did tell me there were a few times that his dad gave him antibiotics for a bug out of his stores. according to the co-worker, there is apparently little difference between drugs for us two-footeds and drugs for the four-footed crowd. makes sense, i guess, if you assume there has to a be QC for veterinary drugs just like there is for human meds.
In many cases it is harder to get into vet school than med school. There are fewer slots for vet school and they still have a lot of people apply.
There are specialty vets , some only do surgery and there are even vet cancer specialists. My vets don’t do much surgery now, they refer to a vet surgeon for most surgery.
Not quite – I think it’s very rare for students to drop out of vet school. Vet school admissions are usually what prevent people from entering the profession, with acceptance rates around 10%. I’ve known some pre-vet students who were repeatedly rejected from vet school. Later they gave up and were then accepted at top medical schools.
Most vets would be insulted by such a comparison. 
There is a difference in dosages, though. Our seven-pound chihuahua takes 1/4 of a tablet of Tramadol for her back and my 190 lb. husband takes a full tablet. She is still wide awake after she is dosed and he is out like a light. As long as you know how much you’re supposed to take, though, erythromycin is erythromycin.
I’ll second these. My dog is on about eight different meds, and all but one come from the human pharmacy. I do have to cut them up into halves and quarters, though, which can be maddening.
Just go easy when you’re taking my temperature.