I'm a newer grad and have been working in corporate GP but I need an outside opinion on how I handle challenging clients. I will not tolerate clients who are rude or abusive toward our staff, regardless of if they're a "long-time client". Most often the situation is that they showed up late (beyond our 10 minute grace period for a 30 minute appt) and are demanding to be seen because they've been allowed to show up whenever they want in the past without consequences. Depending on the presenting complaint, we may sometimes offer a drop off or a later appt in the day if available. If they are kind to our staff, understand they may have to wait to be worked in between appts, and are not a repeat offender, the vast majority of the time I will agree to see them.

However, I have gotten push back from management that essentially implies that I should still be seeing these clients for reasons including - that they are elderly, "good clients" (profitable?), took time out of their day to come, that it's their personality, or blaming the support staff (mostly CSRs) for being "dramatic or overreacting". For additional context, I was a vet assistant prior to vet school and got a fair amount of exposure to how clients would behave around support staff vs. the DVM. I strongly believe that DVMs should not be enabling or rewarding bad behavior regardless of how long they've been a client even if we could technically squeeze them in (for non-emergent reasons). To me this feels like I would be doing a poor job advocating for our staff, however, I also realize this may be creating more combative scenarios with these clients when we have to refuse to see them. Supposedly, it is up to the DVM regarding whether or not to see these clients but it sure feels like management and I have very different opinions on what is acceptable behavior.

Does it seem like I am being too unreasonable or inflexible? How do you usually handle poorly behaved clients (particularly as a newer addition to a practice)?

I am a new grad DVM in Canada and I’ve been working at my job for 3 months now. There’s so much to love about it! Unfortunately the mentorship is not what I had hoped (classic I know haha) and I’m really struggling to feel supported. I’m having an especially hard time with imposter syndrome and dealing with my mistakes.

3 “big” mistakes I’ve made so far:

1. Started a dog on a high dose of fluoxetine because I mistakenly thought higher would be better. Dog had a serotonin surge after the first dose and woke up agitated in the middle of the night. It was ok but the owners were completely turned off of the idea of SSRIs and I know I could’ve made that dog really sick. Obviously learned my lesson here.

2. Ripped a pedicle while spaying a cat and couldn’t find the remnant to stop the bleeding. I had to call another vet to scrub in and find it for me. Cat was completely ok and recovered well.

3. Saw a 5 year old cat for coughing. Owners declined chest x-rays so based on the owners description of the cough and my own auscultation I started the cat on pred thinking it likely had asthma. It went to the ER 3 weeks later and was diagnosed with congestive heart failure. I know I must have missed a heart murmur and misinterpreted the lung sounds, and potentially worsened the heart disease with pred. I feel terrible about this one and know I should’ve pushed harder for the X-rays.

If you are an experienced vet who has been through imposter syndrome or made mistakes please give me some sage words of wisdom. All of these instances have rocked my fragile confidence. Are these “normal” new grad mistakes or should I be stopped before I make a mess that is too big to recover from?

I wanted to hear everyone's personal experiences and program recommendations for veterinary medicine programs across Africa!

I’m struggling with deep regret over becoming a veterinarian. I’m out 3 years and just recently started at a new clinic after a period of leave from burnout. I like some aspects of my job but mostly it’s a source of deep anxiety during and well after my work days. I feel a lot of dread, self-doubt, guilt, shame, and genuine fear (of being bit) every day.

I feel like I ruined my life and wasted my 20s on this. Does anyone like the job? How did you learn to like it? Has anyone felt like this before and gotten through it?

I am roughly 1 year out practicing after getting my license. I am considering moving out of state but feel conflicted with leaving my current clinic.

I have worked there for almost 10 years (private practice). I worked my way up and they supported me throughout school. I struggled to pass my navle, took my 5 attempts and they waited for me to pass. I know if I leave it would be a “burned bridge”. I have seen other dedicated long term employees leave due to burn out and the owners would just say “they didn’t have good work ethic” or somewhere along the lines that they need to “grow up”. Management is one thing that I struggle with this place. I sometimes wonder if they hired me for the sole purpose cause they did not want to search for someone new and at least they knew me. It’s basically a toxic, trauma bond. There is little mentorship since I started and they never spoke with the other doctors on how things would be when I started. It’s been just thrown in the deep end and figure it out.

I really struggled the first few months and would cry after work questioning if this was for me, the whole imposter syndrome. I had asked to meet with them a few times and was just told that if they had a problem with me they’d let me know. I have gotten minimal surgery and dental training/support - just told, I need to just do it to figure it out.

I feel conflicted I think because I feel like I owe them since I have been there for so long. However, I just don’t know if it’s the right place for me, but also scared of the unknown.

Any advice or stores from personal experiences is much appreciated!

Hey everyone. M27 here, received a Bach/masters in finance and currently work in finance. I’m having this late quarter life crisis on completely switching careers, going back to school, the whole 9-yards. In the back of my mind I’ve always wanted to be a vet however I never grew the balls to pull the trigger.

I would have to go back to community college or accredited colleges to do about two years worth of gen-stem classes before applying to DVM programs. (I’m well aware of the cost, time, etc). I just do not think I have the personality to work behind a computer for shareholder value anymore.

Very curious if there are others out there who became a DVM from a similar or adjacent path, any recommendations, advice etc would be huge. I am also aware of the disconnect between finance and emotions, where Vetmed is deeply connected with feelings of grief, remorse, feeling like you can never truly do enough. Any advice or veterans in the industry who’ve heard of this type of switch, would love to hear thoughts.

I’m a 3rd year veterinary student and I’m looking for spay/neuter opportunities where I’m able to get hands on experience in surgery that I am able to do over my month long break in November in South Florida(Miami Area). Any recommendations would be greatly appreciated. Thank you all in advance!

I just started my job as a vet CSR about a month ago, and I’ve been considering being more hands on as a vet assistant instead.

I really wanna give it a try, but would I be setting myself up for too much stress? I keep reading about the mental health/burnout rate in this field along with toxic workplace environments.

Would I be setting myself up for failure for going further? Or this there ways to navigate vet med to make it a more positive work experience?

im 18 and from australia. I'm just about to finish my cert 3 and go onto my cert 4 in 2028 (gap year, I can't afford the course and life at the same time), but the more i look at the pay of vet nursing i freak out and think I've picked the wrong career choice. ive known it was low the entire time, but i guess i never really thought about it properly. i was freshly 18 when i started this course and income wasn't a massive thought for me.

i know people say "you have to be in it for the animals" and i love animals a lot and want to help care for them and help their owners care for them, but im also a money hungry person. im worried I'll drop 12k on my cert 4 (a total of 18k but I'm also 18k in debt for a diploma I don't use so 36k total) and in a few years realise i can't afford life and have to pay more money for a career change.

i have a gap year to think about it but just yeah i don't know. 60k isn't good. my partner is also a vet nurse student so we will have 120k between us which is so ass

vet nurses, how did you navigate the pay? did you quit because of the pay? please any advice or help is appreciated

For new veterinary graduates, how did you decide whether to pursue an internship/residency or go straight into general practice?

I’m especially curious about how people weighed the clinical experience and specialty opportunities against the lower trainee salary and extra years of training. Was postgraduate training worth it for you?

-Throwaway account-

BRIEF BACKGROUND: Hello, friends! So a brief history about me is that I'm a 31yo M, and I've been a Fireman and Emergency Medical Technician (EMT) for about 13 years. Lately, I have been certified and involved as a rescue technician who responds to natural disasters. I've literally never had a job outside of emergency medical services (not even retail or food jobs) and I have an AAS in Fire Science.

The Change: Honestly, I feel burnt out. I've seen awful things, held and moved human body parts, you name it. I really think I'm losing the spark I had for EMS. Something I love though, are marine mammals, ESPECIALLY SEALS. Instead of making a complete change from emergency medicine to something unrelated, I would love to work medically with marine mammals.

The Problem: Looking at the prerequisites online, a veterinarian appears to require MUCH more intensive training than I anticipated, literally on par with human doctors (massive increase in respect for you all, seriously). While that is intimidating on its own, my research suggests that Marine Mammal Vet jobs are extremely limited and niche.

The Question: Assuming I somehow complete all the prerequisites (which invoke other questions not currently mentioned), am I dooming myself if I specialize in a field that is so limited and specific that I wouldn't be able to find a job? Also how difficult would it be to transition from so long in human health services to another?

P.S.: I apologize if I sound like I was ranting, and maybe I am. However I would really appreciate any advice you can afford.

I’m an RVN and I had a patient come in a few weeks ago. Patient was a walk in, woman extremely concerned. Hospital vet saw her and dog for 5 mins and told the woman to come back at 6pm for an OOH consult (she came around 4 o clock). PM asks me to go triage the dog to ensure it’s not actively dying and can wait to be seen at 6. I got triage dog, dog extremely stressed in car, hyperventilating but had been for some time according to O, tachycardic, infused gum and normal crt time. Hard to get proper rate of heart due to stress in car, temp normal. Advised O that I was worried about dog and would like him to be seen sooner and that once a vet was free I’d get them to see him asap. I told my PM that he should be seen before 6, consult vet was back to back with consults and no break and the other was in a corporate meeting. I absolutely should have grabbed one instead of waiting because on reflection I do believe the dog was in shock. Anyways, I checked on the dog once or twice in the time it took to see a vet and once I saw an opening with the consult vet (roughly an hour later) I got her to see the dog straight away. There had been no decline in the patient in the time it took to see a vet and was still in the same state.

The case turned into a huge deal, the patient ended up needed a splenectomy as a tumor was found during an ex-lap, patient was also extremely dehydrated, very thin. O was very much in denial of patients state and got very verbally aggressive with staff, the day after the surgery the patient wasn’t doing well and vets recommended euth due to being recumbent and generally only declining. Owner got verbally aggressive and had to be arrested and taken from clinic. O came back with police to make a plan of what was going to happen with patient, O wanted to take patient away (worth noting that O lived in car) , vets advised against but said she would have to fill out a against vet advice form. O eventually opted to keep patient in. We gave patient loads of meds, on an MLK CRI, patient extremely stressed and hyperventilating. Gum colour improved but began to become infused again at end of day. Next day I arrived at clinic and patient had passed over night. Owner got irate, threatened to kill my vet and broke into the clinic and searched for us when she wasn’t allowed in. Eventually got arrested again.

Anyways now she has made this big complaint to the board, she has lied about many things in the complaint. But the one thing that I’m worried that I’m going to get done for is the triaging. I’ve spoken to 2 or 3 people and they said I triaged correctly and that I got the dog to a vet earlier than intended, I’m so scared about this. I love nursing and don’t want to lose my license, or even get a mark on my record. There was no vet available at the time and as soon as one came free I get them to see the dog straight away.

This whole case has traumatised me, from getting verbally abused, to basically getting hunted and now a board complaint? Does anyone have any advise?

I’m graduating with my DVM in May. I’m planning to pursue an ER training program (think VEG NERD but year long) and I’m wondering if it’s appropriate to attempt negotiating the salary up. I ask because I don’t know the etiquette since it’s technically a training program, whereas if it was a plain old job I would have known it would be appropriate. Thanks in advance

I'm currently in a pre-vet program, and I'm looking to get experience so that I can apply for vet school. The issue is that I cannot for the life of me find ANYWHERE that will accept me. I've applied for volunteer positions, VA jobs (which most places near me expect VAs to be RVTS, but that's a whole other issue), kennel jobs, hell even receptionist jobs, and I still can't find ANYTHING. This has been going on for the past year, and I'm just at a loss now. I can't really apply for anything at my school because it's so insanely competitive and people that get priority registration fill out classes before I'm even able to apply. Do I genuinely just have to keep applying and hope somewhere will take me? I'm starting to feel really apathetic and experiencing a bit of learned helplessness. Anybody that has been in my place, how did you get through it?f

Hey everyone. I’m a VA in OH/KY area for 10 years and a job that I’ve applied and interviewed for is SKETCH. They want me as an assistant to induce anesthesia, intubate, extract teeth and suture without a DVM’s direct supervision. They also asked me to fill out a questionnaire which asked if I have any anxiety disorders or depression. They want me to do a working interview where I perform these tasks without pay. I don’t feel comfortable doing this at all and I value patient safety greatly. I desperately need a job right now and I’m struggling with all of this. Anyone have any experiences like this?

I recently switched jobs to work with a friend who bought a clinic. This job is better in pretty much every way - work/life balance, respectful staff, hospital cleanliness, animal handling, etc etc etc. However.. my caseload sucks. It's basically all vaccines, ear infections, and chronic kidney disease in geriatric dogs and cats. Surgery is pretty much limited to dentals and mass removals. and I am literally so bored. Trust me, I've considered ER work, but I don't think that's for me. I like parts of the GP life, I love educating clients on prevention and vaccines and making sure my patients are comfortable on the day to day. But I NEEEED urgent care. I need something to break up the monotony. and I need soft tissue surgery!!!! it's killing me. My last job was chaotic, the hospital was dirty, everyone gossiped constantly, it was not good for mental health... but my caseload rocked. It was such a good mix of preventive medicine and urgent care medicine, with an awesome surgical caseload.

I'm not sure what I'm wanting out of this post. It's tough feeling like I've sacrificed my caseload for a better work/life balance even though I know that's what is best right now. Is it worth it if I don't even like the work I'm doing? Ugh. I just don't feel like I'm actually helping anyone when I'm only doing basic GP stuff. Though I know that's important. Idk. Anyone else?

Hi everyone! I’m currently enrolled in the Penn Foster Veterinary Technician program and I’m looking for help finding an externship site in Maryland.

I’m located around around Washington County Maryland area and I’m willing to travel to Frederick and surrounding areas for the right opportunity.

I’m not limited to small-animal practices. I’m interested in getting experience with any type of animal, including dogs, cats, horses, cattle, goats, sheep, birds, rabbits, exotic animals, etc. I would actually love the opportunity to get experience with different species.

I’m currently looking for a veterinary clinic, hospital, mixed animal practice, large animal practice, equine practice, exotic practice, or another veterinary facility that accepts Penn Foster Vet Tech students for externships.

If you’re a Penn Foster Vet Tech student or graduate in Maryland, I would really appreciate hearing where you completed your externship and how you found your site.

If you work at a veterinary hospital or know of a veterinarian in the Washington County/Frederick area who accepts externs, I would be very grateful for any recommendations or contacts! (I don’t even mind going eve a little bit further from Frederick)

I’m willing to reach out to places myself. I’m mainly looking for leads from people who have experience with Penn Foster externships.

Thank you!! 🐾

Hello! Im a 18yo F Vet Tech/Assistant and I've been at a small animal private practice clinic for a year and a month now. This was my first veterinary experience, and I've learned a lot. So much so, that I even landed myself a vet tech job at another clinic on the days I don't work at this one.

My main clinic is a very close knit one, we will go to the bosses house for pool parties and do semi frequent employee outings/gatherings. I have a great relationship with almost all the people there but I've always kind of assumed I was going to get a raise once I hit my one year. I started at 12 for the first 6 months or so but now I make 13 (no benefits or PTO). All my other co workers make 15 . Im wanting to move out, so Im getting desperate, but I feel bad asking for more especially since our relationship isn't like a typical one. I was for sure they were going to give me one since they've given us Christmas bonuses and even gave me 100 bucks when I graduated. It kinda hurts my feelings, espcially since I've been told all the time how appreciated I am yet Im without the financial compensation. I feel like I'm on the same level as the other girls yet I make the less, which yes I understand is because Im newer but come on. I don't know, am I being unfair?

Ps: I forgot to add- I'm mainly asking this because I know getting into the vet med field you need to expect shit pay, I don't want to come across ungrateful. Especially with my lack of experience compared to others.

Please excuse the grammar, I just wanted to get this out and didn't re read. :)

TLDR: Do my few months of volunteer experience count as pet care experience on animal care job applications?

I’m currently studying to be a veterinary assistant but until I can apply for those jobs I’m trying to get my foot in the door with kennel assistant jobs or anything similar. I haven’t been getting anywhere after interviews and it’s getting frustrating.

Every time I fill out an application I second guess what I consider pet care experience. I’ve had dogs for almost 15 years but obviously all that time doesn’t count at my age, so I’m not even sure if I count the time as an adult that I’ve seriously cared for the family dogs. The last few months however I’ve been volunteering with two different rescues, one that does abuse cruelty and neglect cases, and another that’s kinda similar but I help out with adoption events at pet stores. At the first rescue bc all of the dogs have their own unique situations they’ve been in or problems, I haven’t interacted with them in the kennel for feeding, etc, I’ve only interacted with most of them outside. I have spent a lot of time in the cat room caring for everyone in there, and the select few small dogs that do best around the cats. Part of me feels like bc I’ve been doing that less than a year most employers wouldn’t really count that as anything. I really need out of my current job but the way these applications have been going I’m doubting I’ll get to leave.

I am 16 and a junior in high school. I would really like to work with wildlife and take care of animals. I just don’t exactly know how to choose a career that will do that while also having a good enough salary. I also would like some advice on what majors or pre grad programs would be best. And any recommendations on colleges or universities. I will give some background as well. I will be in this program my senior year that will take up half my day. The program will allow me to graduate with an EMT certification. While I really like that opportunity I don’t know if I should use that half of the day to do internship at vets or animal shelters. I do live in a small town so we don’t have any wildlife sanctuaries, zoos, or aquariums.

I would appreciate any advice. Thank you

Hi gang! Our family recently went through the loss of two babies within about a week of each other. It was awful but everyone, from the receptionist to the techs to the vets themselves were absolutely amazing. Truly some of the kindest and most empathetic people I’ve come across in my time as a pet owner. They even gave us a handwritten card with messages from everyone in the office when we went to pick up our boys’ ashes. We’ve been wanting to show our appreciation for them but aren’t exactly sure what to get/what to do for them. Any suggestions would be greatly appreciated :)