Alternatively Speaking: The Veterinarian

Alternatively Speaking:

The Veterinarian/Client Relationship

Dr. Anne Carroll DVM, CVA

In our last article, we talked about the impact of emotional stress on your cat’s health. What we didn’t discuss was that nothing impacts your pet’s quality of life more than their caregivers’ emotional health, including that of their veterinarian. It is true in all medicine, but especially in holistic medicine, that solid relationships between your family and veterinarian form the cornerstone of their healthcare. Like so many of our personal relationships, COVID has put stress on our doctor-client relationships and that has impacted how we provide health care to pets in ways none of us could have imagined. While some COVID restrictions have eased this past summer, the disconnect between client expectations and the veterinarian’s ability to meet those expectations has continued. I am not speaking for all of my colleagues, but from what I can glimpse on social media platforms and talking to other professionals, I hear our situation is almost universal. So I would like to take this opportunity to share our experience and hopefully take a step towards re-building healthy relationships. For the past year and a half, veterinarians and their staff have been frontline caregivers even though the state has not officially recognized us as such. Through the entirety of the pandemic, each practice had to constantly re-invent how to do their jobs to care for patients while keeping staff and clients safe. These changes did not improve our efficiency, instead, they created dramatic increases in time for even the most simple of tasks. In an attempt to handle as much client care as possible, our workdays became 12-14 hours long without relief. Some jobs are easy to walk away from at the end of the official workday, but certainly not this one. Veterinarians and their staff are driven by an intense passion to help animals and their people. It is the relationships built with families and their pets that fuel that passion and is the reward for the demands of this profession. It is certainly not the woeful compensation compared to any other segment of the medical profession, or lack of time for personal self-health. But COVID put a literal wall between us and our pet’s families. It was a struggle to maintain relationships and certainly impossible to forge solid foundations for new ones. We couldn’t refuel our energy banks via interpersonal connections whether to share the joy in healing or offer consolation for loss. Meanwhile, pet visits that would have reinforced how fun it was to go to the vet with wags and snuggles were now sometimes stressful without guardians present, despite all our efforts. On top of all of this, the veterinary staff was still trying to meet client expectations at a pre-COVID level, and that unrealistic goal exacted a huge emotional toll that sometimes made our day-to-day operations feel too daunting to cope with.

All of these behind-the-scenes stresses hopefully shed light on why you may have seen a change in your health care experience for your pets. No one likes ‘curbside’ health care, or the curtailed personal communication that comes with it. Even with offices opening up for more conventional interactions, I am sure in the past few months you may have called a veterinarians’ office and gotten the answering machine or have been told there will be a wait to be seen, or even been referred elsewhere. Even veterinary ER’s are overburdened and are turning away less than life-threatening cases. That is the reality of scarcity, and what gives great value to having a standing, current relationship with your veterinarian. COVID has magnified the need for people to decide what veterinary care means to them. Do you want to get your shots at clinics and only see the veterinarian when there is a serious issue, or do you want a life-long partner promoting wellness to maximize your pet’s healthy longevity? Of course, there are many gradations in between these two extremes, but the point is that you have to choose the type of relationship you want for your pets and then have realistic expectations regarding that choice. With schedules pushed beyond capacity, fitting in sick pets comes down to time and staff constraints. In our practice, we have greater flexibility to ‘squeeze’ someone in when we are current on their baseline info, individual needs, and already have a relationship with their guardian. This relationship allows us to focus on the health issue more efficiently, and that enables us to fit one more patient into our day.

Despite all these hardships, I feel fortunate to still love my job as a veterinarian, especially my ability to specialize in holisFall 2021

tic medicine. In its ideal practice, holistic care nurtures long-standing relationships, and it influences the type of relationship we strive to build with our clients. Holistic medicine is about the “whole”. It is all-encompassing, rooted in establishing a foundation of wellness early on with discussions on feeding and supplementation, vaccination, behavior, etc. that all will have the greatest benefit to your pet. Then over the course of a lifetime being able to see patterns of minor changes, perhaps unnoticed by guardians, that we work to ward off future problems. The longer the relationship the more pet, guardian, and veterinarian benefit. This is in contrast to the patients seen only every couple of years when a medical issue crops up. Out of necessity the focus of these visits is diagnosing and managing the acute issue. Time constraints and lack of background limit longer discussions regarding what led to this issue and interventions to help prevent it from recurring. Treating the same issues chronically without addressing the root cause is unfulfilling for both vet and guardian. Holistic medicine is not for everyone, but even conventional medicine is more rewarding and successful when there is history with a patient, and a commitment made between guardians and veterinarians to care for this loved animal. That is the value of the relationship, not only for that pet’s health but for their guardian and veterinarian’s emotional health. That is why in my practice we are moving to require a patient to be seen at least once yearly to remain an active patient with us. This should allow us to see more patients, reduce acute issues, and feel fulfilled with the medicine we are practicing. So how do you establish a good relationship with your vet so you can be there for each other in these trying times? First, commit to a relationship that you and your pet will benefit from. Don’t think of your vet as someone you hire for service on demand. Establish a relationship before vet care is ‘needed’, so your pet’s first visit can focus on wellness and getting to know the place and staff, not when they are ill and in discomfort. Secondly, keep open communications. Call as soon as you suspect an issue, so we have more flexibility if there is a wait to get your pet seen, without jeopardizing their health or overburdening our staff. Next, be an active partner in this relationship. Take the initiative to order refills or schedule wellness or recheck visits in advance. After sick visits, follow up with us so we are in the loop and able to continue to support your pet’s recovery. In this new reality, veterinary staff’s time is almost exclusively focused on giving care, which means convenience communications and reminders become secondary. Lastly, and most importantly, be patient and kind. We know that concern for pets can make emotions run high. Trust in our commitment to you and together we will do the very best we can in these trying circumstances, as always.

Dr. Anne Carroll is the owner of the

Chelsea Animal Hospital where she and her associates practice conventional medicine and surgery as well as several alternative modalities including traditional Chinese acupuncture and Chinese herbal medicine. For more information on alternative veterinary medicine visit their website at www.chelseaanimalhospital.com .