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  • Dangers of festive gatherings

    Dangers of festive gatherings

    Christmas is a great time for family gatherings, but this does not necessarily mean it is a great time for pets.

    In fact, it can often be the opposite, with veterinary clinics seeing a major increase in patient numbers that come through the door.

    One common emergency we see at the emergency hospital during the festive season is dog fight and bite wounds. As vets, we have a duty of care to educate pet owners during this time, so they – and their pet – have the best Christmas possible and do not end up in the emergency room.

    Why do dogs fight and bite at Christmas?

    Usually during the festive period, family or friends increasingly gather to celebrate. Whether it is people coming into their home, or them being taken to someone’s home, this can be confusing and cause anxiety levels to rise.

    When a family member or friend brings a new pet into the house with an existing pet, it creates competition for food, space, affection and attention – and this can lead to dog fights. Even usually mild-mannered pets can easily feel threatened by a new pet entering their territory, and may lash out.

    Increases in noise, people, decorations and general chaos during the holiday season can cause stress and anxiety. For dogs protective of their domain and the people in it, this can be a difficult and uncertain time.

    Children not used to pets, and pets not used to young children, can also be a dangerous combination. Dog bites are a common injury sustained by children during the festive period and it could often be avoided.

    Solutions

    Although dogs are part of the family, it is important owners understand leaving their dog at home when they go to a festive gathering is not leaving them out, but protecting them and making sure they are more safe, comfortable and happy.

    If hosting a party, owners can shut their dog in another room away from the chaos and noise – they will be grateful to have a peaceful space. This is a must for a dog already prone to stress.

    Children and dogs should not be left alone and should be monitored at all times. If the dog starts to show signs of anxiety and stress, it should be taken somewhere it feels comfortable and calm.

    Owners can take their dog to their vet for a behavior assessment. Anti-anxiety medications could be considered in extreme cases, but this would be a last resort.

    Communicating messages

    We can educate pet owners in the lead-up to Christmas in many ways. We can offer thoughtful, engaging and informative advice and guidance.

    Some ways to communicate festive dangers to pet owners include:

    • infographics
    • videos
    • social media posts
    • posters in the hospital or clinic
    • blogs
    • email campaigns
    • discussing the dangers at check-ups and appointments
    • newsletters
    • flyers
    • special calls to clients with an anxious pet
    • education events, such as how to manage pets and children

    Here’s to a very merry – and safe – Christmas.

  • Supporting new grads: are you up to the job?

    Supporting new grads: are you up to the job?

    As I discussed in my previous blog post, if you are a boss, partner or practice manager, it’s important to consider whether your practice is suitable for a new graduate, before taking one on.

    Perhaps you’re considering taking on a new grad for the first time, or maybe you’ve employed them before, but are struggling to attract candidates for your job vacancies – or it might be your new grads are leaving you after a short spell of employment.

    If any of these apply, or you’re simply looking for inspiration on what you could do to offer support to new grads, I’d like to offer some suggestions from the new grads themselves.

    Friendly face of support

    Every new graduate looks for “support” in his or her first (or, in my case, second) vet role, but what exactly does that look like?

    By far the most important aspect of support is communication – we’re all different, and the key to a great working relationship with a new grad is asking him or her the kind of support wanted or needed, and discussing how you can provide that.

    This should also be considered a fluid, flexible conversation that continues through the first few months of employment – the rate at which a new grad gains confidence and experience will vary due to individual personalities, but will also greatly depend on caseload.

    Vet and assistant.
    Being patient, friendly and answering questions are all important when dealing with a new grad. Image © .shock / Adobe Stock

    Never assume

    If your practice doesn’t see many cats, your new grad’s first cat spay might not happen for several months, and you can’t just assume having performed a lot of other surgeries, he or she will be fine to just get stuck in, when he or she may never have used a flank approach before.

    On the contrary, some new grads can be dangerously over-confident, and that’s where your clinical and character judgement will be vital in ensuring the safety of their patients.

    It can be a very delicate balancing act between pushing a new grad to improve, and not letting him or her charge in all guns blazing without the right skills.

    Suggestions

    The answer is not straightforward – no “one size fits all” new graduate induction plan exists – but a number of areas can be considered to help your new grad settle in.

    I’m not suggesting you action all of them, or even that they’d all be suitable for every new grad or practice – they’re just ideas to think about.

    • Provide a booklet with practice protocols – for example:
      • vaccine protocol
      • neutering advice (ages)
      • treatment protocols for common ailments (as a starting point)
      • what should be included in estimates for operations
    • Order uniform or name badges and have them ready for the first day. It may seem trivial, but it symbolises being part of the team. Being asked 10 times a day who you are, or “are you new here?” gradually chips away at what little confidence you have as a new grad.

      Woman with folders and badge
      Ordering a name badge for your new grad can help him or her feel part of the team. Image © kegfire / Adobe Stock
    • Have him or her spend a morning on reception to learn how to book appointments and other tasks, to get used to the computer system.
    • Put a nurse or receptionist in consults with the new grad to help him or her navigate charging for consults, saving notes, making up estimates and so on.
    • Have the new grad observe some consults or accompany other vets on call-outs to help him or her grasp how the practice runs and to introduce some of your regular clients.
    • Allow the new grad to pick up consults from a general list at his or her own pace.
    • Book out double appointments for the new grad initially, then shorten these as he or she gets more confident – and, therefore, faster.
    • Always have a more experienced vet available (in the prep room, perhaps) to answer those quick questions while the new grad is consulting. He or she need not be twiddling his or her thumbs, but, if performing procedures, ensure your new grad knows he or she can pop in and ask without feeling like an inconvenience.
    • Decide on a maximum length of time for a consulting block and allow breaks for the new grad to catch up or have five minutes to gather his or her thoughts.
    • Assign a formal buddy or mentor within the practice (not the boss) for him or her to go to as a first port of call for any problems – clinical or non-clinical.
    • Provide regular constructive feedback – we don’t know if we’re doing okay unless you tell us!
    • Have formal scheduled progress review meetings to let the new grad discuss any issues in a fair manner (the boss informally asking “how are you doing?” in front of half the staff will not always elicit an honest response).
    • Have a working list of procedures or cases your new grad wants to gain experience in so all staff know to try to involve him or her if they get one in. Similarly, have a list of procedures he or she is happy to do alone (and an expected timescale) so reception staff don’t book in three bitch spays on day one.
    • Supervision for operations – ask your new grad whether he or she wants someone scrubbed in, either in the same room or just within shouting distance, for different procedures.
    • Have goals for the new grad to work towards without pressurising him or her.
    • Show the new grad respect. Don’t undermine him or her in front of clients, even if he or she is in the wrong – better ways of addressing it exist without shattering the new grad’s confidence and credibility.

      Vets talking.
      Assigning your new grad a buddy or mentor can help as a first port of call for any problems he or she may encounter. Image © michaeljung / Adobe Stock
    • Take on board any suggestions the new grad may have in practice discussions – he or she will have the most up-to-date knowledge, and it can be a huge confidence boost to have your ideas taken up.
    • Try not to put your new grad to the bottom of the pile for holidays. In fact, some bosses almost force new grads to book a holiday after two months because they know they’ll need it.
    • Give the new grad a Christmas at home (or at least the choice of doing so). Nobody wants to work at Christmas, but is it advisable to have a stressed out new grad – who will likely still need backup in December – on call for the busiest “my dog’s eaten the Christmas pud” poisoning fest of the year? He or she will have likely moved a long way from home and will be particularly lonely at this time of year.
    • Have formal second on-call in place for as long as the new grad needs. Don’t assume he or she will be fine after six months – this will vary greatly depending on caseload.

    Making a difference

    From discussing our varying inductions and levels of support with my university friends, by far the most important thing is just being patient and friendly – even when it’s crazily busy.

    Taking 30 seconds to answer a question will make a huge difference for the new grad, rather than letting us spend ages unable to find the answer in an ancient textbook.

    If you take an interest in your new grad’s learning and development, rather than just employing us for cheap labour, you’re already heading in the right direction and your efforts to welcome us into the profession will be greatly appreciated.

  • The beginning of the end of vet school

    The beginning of the end of vet school

    Hospital
    Exams passed, Jordan can walk the halls of Glasgow’s small animal hospital without feeling like an imposter.

    As regular readers of this blog may have noticed, I was a little apprehensive about starting my final year at veterinary school…

    Having already been in the small animal hospital for two days, we finally received our results – confirming I and many of my fellow classmates had passed our exams and could now wear our final year jackets without guilt and walk around the hospital without feeling like imposters.

    However, despite now knowing we had qualified to be in the hospital, it still felt like we had been thrown in the deep end.

    In at the deep end

    My first rotation was emergency and critical care, with the first part being internal medicine. The first couple of days were spent frantically researching the background of patients coming in for appointments, bumbling through clinical exams and brushing up on my rusty practical skills.

    It was my first time taking consults alone and, after missing out key questions the first few times, I eventually got into the swing of things and made fewer mistakes.

    cat scratch quote
    Image: seregraff / Fotolia.

    Despite feeling like I didn’t know anything to begin with, I at least managed to scrape together a few sensible ideas when clinicians tried to worm differentials out of us. It has been a steep learning curve, changing the way of thinking entirely to apply things to a real patient in front of you, which usually has not read the textbook.

    OOH my goodness

    Just as I was beginning to feel comfortable with medicine, we swapped to out of hours – which, against my presumptions, turned out to be a really enjoyable week.

    I adjusted to nights far easier than I expected and was powering through until one particularly long night when a bulldog came in with a suspected gastric dilatation volvulus (GDV).

    This was the first genuine emergency we’d been involved in and stress levels were running high. Having rapidly set up fluid boluses, taken radiographs to confirm our suspicions, checked lactate levels and run in-house bloods, we went through to theatre. After a very long night of surgery and having warned the owner of an extremely grave prognosis, we were delighted to see said bulldog looking bright and happy the following evening, eating and pulling us down the corridors to the runs outside.

    Not all GDVs end with such a happy ending, as we had learned earlier in the week – a dog that underwent the surgery at its own vets came to us for overnight care in ICU and, after a rocky night of a supraventricular tachycardia that we struggled to keep under control, crashed the following morning, was resuscitated successfully once, but could not be saved when it crashed again minutes later.

    Hearts, not brains

    Coming from nights straight back into days, however, was much harder and I felt like a zombie for the first day of my cardiology week.

    On the subsequent days, when my brain was working again, I was able to make a bit more sense of echocardiography and gain a better understanding of some conditions and the tray menu options available.

    I also learned a bit more about the genetics of Bengal cats and found trying to heart scan a cat that’s only two generations away from a leopard cat can be quite challenging (and may involve chasing said cat around the ultrasound room for some time, following an artful escape act).

    This year isn’t going to be a picnic, but, although I already feel exhausted, if last month is anything to go by, it will be an enjoyable one.

  • What makes a good vet?

    Supervet
    Vets aren’t superheroes… or are they?
    Original image ©iStock.com/VasjaKoman

    As a student on placement, I’m often in awe of the vets I’m working with. The ability to take a history, examine an animal, run through differentials and come up with a diagnosis or action plan within 10 minutes – all while listening to an owner commenting on the weather or traffic – seems superhuman.

    This may seem an exaggeration (after all, vets aren’t superheroes), but when considered like that, it is pretty impressive.

    While seemingly intangible at the moment, I know the ability to do this with such ease comes with practice – and clearly some presentations are far more complex than that.

    However, while I find this impressive, others have a different opinion…

    A family friend recently commented on their own vets, claiming they would avoid seeing the partners if possible because – in their opinion – they see an animal for five minutes and see it as a money making exercise, whereas the younger vets spend a bit more time with the clients.

    Obviously I can’t comment on the vet/client rapport, which may have a huge influence on this opinion, but I can’t help but think that a younger, newly qualified vet would spend more time during consultations purely due to experience, or lack thereof.

    It has become evident recently that the profession has an image problem and we must try to change that for the better. But what do the public consider as a “good vet”? Apparently the opinion differs depending which side of the table you’re on.

    This is just one example, but in general, do clients want the vet to spend more time with their animal? They probably do – but, at the same time, they don’t want to be kept waiting and they want to be able to get an appointment. There has to be a balance between the three.

    As for cost, I’ve seen some vets charge meticulously, whereas others would try and keep prices as low as possible to please customers. In the clients’ eyes, the cheaper the better. But a vet practice has to function. It’s no good offering neutering for £10 because the practice would be bankrupt within a week.

    House
    “The most highly qualified and experienced surgeon in the practice might not be the best at client communication,” claims Jordan.

    Surgical skills and experience are perhaps something that the client will never fully appreciate. For a start, the vet seen in the consultation room may not be the same one who performed the operation, particularly if it’s something fairly routine. Also, the most highly qualified and experienced surgeon in the practice might not be the best at client communication.

    A vet can have such a diverse set of skills and knowledge that it is difficult to pinpoint which of these defines a “good vet”. Many vets have certain areas of expertise and will be better than others in certain situations, but not all.

    The key to time and money is striking the balance between what the client desires and what is realistic.

    Communication, however, doesn’t need to be compromised and can be the difference that alters the client’s opinion. For example, the manner in which an examination is conducted and the attitude of the vet during a 10-minute consult could leave the client feeling rushed, whereas a different vet with a different approach could leave the client with a far more positive impression.

    Client opinion is important, but at the end of the day, the welfare of the animal in front of you is your priority, whether or not the client values you highly.

    While the profession as a whole should take heed of what clients want, the customer is not necessarily always right, and at the end of the day, it is the welfare of the animal in front of you that should be paramount.