Not enough vets and more pets is a recipe for burnout in the veterinarian profession.
Veterinarians are inundated with appointments at clinics and hospitals and often do not have the staff to keep up.https://www.houstonpress.com/news/surging-pet-adoptions-collide-with-longstanding-vet-shortages-15169212After losing one of their own veterinarians to suicide, Robert Fisher, the hospital director at Garden Oak Veterinary Clinic had to turn to several relief veterinarians – veterinarians from outside clinics – to step in and provide coverage.
Even though some veterinary schools are reaching record numbers of enrollment – as at Texas A&M University – schools need to continue to expand those enrollments to curb the shortage and keep up with the rise in demand, those in the profession say. “We absolutely flooded the market during the pandemic, anyone who wanted a pet got one, and now those pets need additional veterinary care,” Fischer said. “And now we’re realizing that there aren’t enough veterinarians to keep up with the growth of the industry.
Not only is there a need for additional veterinarians able to provide this health care to the growing number of pets, the type of care they have to provide now has shifted, said Dr. Natalie Lang, Medical Director and Veterinarian at VEG Houston. And pet owners, Lang said, are not always the easiest clients to handle in situations that involve their pets’ health.
Lang is a veterinarian who specializes in emergency care, handling critical cases on a daily basis. She said often pet owners don’t understand what veterinarians learn and employ to do what they do. This adds yet another burden as hours for emergency veterinarians are often unpredictable, Lang said. This idea of bringing the animal owner along, Lang said, tackled those difficult client interactions alleviating some of the pressure patient interactions had on her. This practice also helped facilitate the education and awareness that is often lacking between pet-owners and their pets’ health care providers.
The higher rate among veterinary technicians also may be affected by the amount of money they earn for the type of work they do. “These young adults are leaving school with between $200,000 to $400,000 in debt,” Fisher said. “Imagine that stress on top of everything else, that’s why there has to be good mentorship of these younger veterinarians.”
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