Fighting Compassion Fatigue In The Veterinary IndustryAugust 30, 2012 You sit in a chair, listening to a person across the room talk about the horrible accident she witnessed. Through her tears, she describes the vehicle, the scene as it happened in slow-motion, the way her beloved family member’s body looked after being struck. In this scenario, you could be a social worker or counselor, trying to absorb your client’s story while avoiding becoming emotionally involved in the situation as it unfolds in words in front of you—trying to avoid the post-traumatic stress that is part of your job day in and day out as you witness peoples’ worst nightmares happening in real life. Now, you look in the mirror and you are wearing scrubs. The beloved family member, Fluffy, lies in back on a table while the team tries to revive the animal that has been hit by a car right in front of your client. Nothing prepared you for this part of the job as a veterinary professional, the intense tales of trauma, illness, even abuse and neglect. You walk out of the room fighting the urge to cry. Nowhere do you remember reading that being a veterinary technician meant reliving horrible …
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Supporting A Veterinarian Colleague After The Loss Of A PetAugust 24, 2012 Having a good friend who focuses on hospice and end-of-life, the topic of pet loss comes up often. Add to that the euthanasia of my dear Rosy, and grief and bereavement has been a discussion that has been close to our hearts these days. The conversation often moves to talk about how we support each other in the veterinary profession with our own pet loss. Unfortunately, many scenarios involve the hard truth that we do NOT do a good job at “companioning” each other through the loss of our own pets. “Companioning” is the word that is best used to denote the emotional support offered during grief and bereavement. While there are professionals who “counsel” people in grief and have the credentials, expertise and experience to do so, those of us who are well-meaning friends and family can provide comfort from a “companion” rather than a counselor. It is still very important and is the resource most of us use for our own grief. It is not common for our clients to seek counseling after the loss of a pet, and it is almost …
Taking Pride In Your WorkAugust 17, 2012 As we all know, veterinary medicine is a passion, a calling, but it is also a business. So when I’m out and about in the big world, I can’t help but compare our business to those businesses I visit. I notice things like the parking lot, the store cleanliness, the behavior of the employees, promotional marketing campaigns, and especially the customer service. When I come across sub-par customer service, I can’t help but think, gee, I hope “we” are doing better than this, with “we” being the entire veterinary profession! After all, we each represent our practice, sure, but we also represent the entirety of our profession and have the ability to affect a client’s opinion of veterinary medicine as a whole. I was in a large-store-that-sells-everything the other day buying some pajamas for my daughter…she had grown, again. This is not a big budget item for us, knowing she’ll need more when it gets cold here in Wisconsin, and it’s likely that we parents will be the only one to really see her in them. So the garments I was buying were, well, “cheap,” in really every meaning of the word and that’s OK by me. Then …
Knowing What To ExpectAugust 10, 2012 As veterinary professionals, we all understand the concept of diagnostics, the search to find out what is wrong with the animal so we can treat the problem, and give the pet owner some idea of what to expect in the future. If you’ve ever had to present a treatment plan to a client, then you know how this conversation goes. But have you stopped to think of all the factors that a client must consider when making a decision about diagnostics? Once again, my experience with my sick little kitty, Rosy, illuminates this small part of our job as veterinary professionals who are trying to heal the sick and support the family. Hang on as you enter the Twilight Zone…well, really just my muddled mind as I work through this experience of being the client. Rosy has been doing better this week, no vomiting, eating pretty well, drinking lots of water and stools almost look normal. Wow, maybe she’s not sick after all! Geez, now that I’ve mentally prepared myself somewhat for the inevitable loss of Rosy, maybe she’s not as sick and will be with me much longer. Her mood is good and she’s loving her …
Veterinary Practice Loans On The UpswingAugust 9, 2012 For veterinarians ready to go out on their own, the timing may be right to purchase an existing practice–as long as they have stellar credit, access to liquid assets, a polished business plan and a seller who’s willing to carry a percentage of the loan, according to veterinary loan experts. “The market is fairly active on the acquisition front,” says Travis York, senior loan officer for Live Oak Bank headquartered in Wilmington, N.C. “We’re getting a lot of calls from people who want to buy practices in the current economy, and there are some veterinarians who are OK with the fact that they need to sell and retire.” William Murray, national sales director for Bank of America’s Practice Solutions veterinary division, reports similar activity. “We’re seeing a lot more first-time practice owners coming to the table looking for financing,” he says from his New York City office. “About 60 percent of our business right now is associates who are buying out the [practice] owner or purchasing an existing practice outright.” The hitch: Some of those ready-to-retire practitioners are sitting on the fence, says Byron Farquer, DVM, who sits on the board of directors for VeterinaryLoans.com, …
Could You Retire With $1 Million?August 9, 2012 We have all kinds of fascinating conversations in the OR. Whenever I dare to suggest that people need at least $1 million to retire (some people now say you need much more), I typically get the “have you totally lost your marbles” look. In fact, I recently saw an online report that said that a couple with two kids needed $3.5 million to retire comfortably. Surely, a mil sounds like a lot of money … until you do the math. Financial advisers often say that if you do have a $1 million nest egg the day you retire, you should only withdraw about 4 percent during the first year. Then during the following years, you should adjust that amount for inflation to maintain your standard of living. I didn’t make that up, believe me. Here is a quote from a recent article1 on the subject: “If you withdraw 4 percent of your savings in the first year of retirement and boost that amount annually for inflation, chances are your money will last 30 years.” But back to our example. Let's do the math for year one of our theoretical retiree: 4 percent of …
Buying A Veterinary Practice? Your History And Clinic’s Are KeyAugust 6, 2012 In today’s market, many veterinarians consider practice ownership an avenue to securing their financial future. There is security in being the boss, dictating medical protocols and having the long-term opportunity to be rewarded for your hard work and time. Often, the key question is not whether to own a practice, but instead how to accomplish the goal. Lenders will ask some key questions as they consider financing a practice acquisition. A lender will review seven primary items related to the individual borrower as well as the practice. They are personal credit score, personal debt obligations, personal liquidity, business and personal collateral, experience, business cash flow, and whether the purchase price is supported by standard business valuations. Credit Score and Debt Obligations These individual factors are not influenced by the practice targeted for purchase. Potential practice owners can start to build these pieces of their resumes while still in veterinary school. The credit score is driven by several key items. The one that everyone is aware of is the history of payments on personal obligations. Any missed payments will reduce a score and decrease loan options. One missed payment will not restrict a veterinarian from …
Front Office FrustrationsAugust 3, 2012 The other day, we needed to order more heartworm, flea and tick preventive for our Cavalier named Joy (notice the Bark Busters “bah bag” next to her in photo!). She is boarded on occasion and we ran out of preventive right before a camping trip; we take our Georgia with us camping, but Joy tries to eat all the vegetation and just acts nervous the whole time. One of our challenges with Joy is that she has some type of intermittent GI mess that causes bloody diarrhea and bad cramping. Previously we switched her to a hypoallergenic diet, and we resist giving her anything other than that special food, including chewable heartworm preventive. So at that time we switched her to a topical that does it all: heartworm, flea and tick. My partner called the veterinary clinic so we could run up real quick on a Saturday before they closed (yes, we are that family that is calling at 11 a.m. despite your closing at noon! No, we didn’t see before that we were out, and yes, of course, it was an emergency!...all said with a smile, but don’t we all hate “those” clients?) …
‘Speaking For Spot,’ Dr. Nancy Kay And Dr. Leo BustadAugust 1, 2012 Since 1999, the human-animal bond sessions at the American Veterinary Medical Association convention open with the the Bustad Memorial Lecture. What a wonderful legacy! Nancy Kay, DVM, Dipl. ACVIM, is the 2011 Bustad Companion Animal Veterinarian winner. She was invited to present the Bustad Memorial lecture but informed the Board of the American Association of Human-Animal Bond Veterinarians (AAH-ABV) that she had a schedule conflict. I offered to present for Dr. Kay. We were faculty for the VSIPP conference at Del Coronado last year where I attended her excellent keynote lecture. Since I had read her book and was also the 1999 Bustad recipient, Dr. Kay and Dr. Robin Downing, president of the AAH-ABV, took me up on the offer. It’s truly an honor and requires double duty because I want to highlight Dr. Bustad’s brilliant life and feature Dr. Nancy Kay’s bestselling book, “Speaking for Spot.” Leo K. Bustad, DVM, Ph.D., 1920-1999 Leo Bustad started veterinary school after serving in the infantry and being a prisoner of war during WWII. He was a newlywed and a new WSU graduate at boot camp. On the ship to Africa, Leo was swept overboard during …
When Veterinary Professionals Learn From Each OtherJuly 27, 2012I hear that attendees learn more during the 10-15 minute breaks talking to each other, than the 50 minutes of lecture they just sat through.On a recent trip to Australia, attendees had as much to learn from each other as from the material I was presenting.July 27, 2012 Let me tell you about a remarkable discovery I witnessed. Recently I returned from a trip to Australia, where I discovered the first-hand beauty of the koala and kangaroo in their native habitat. But besides that, I was also reintroduced to the remarkable energy that is generated when we learn from each other. You see, I was invited to come teach practice management to owners and employees of veterinary referral practices in Australia. This was one of the first times, if not the actual first time, these professionals had gathered in one place to discuss the challenges of managing in referral practice; they would often see each other at IVECCS, yet this was the first gathering “Down Under” as it were, and I was very fortunate to have been invited. At the beginning of the three-day meeting, I announced as I often do that this was to …
