Are career path programs the solution to a clinician shortage in veterinary medicine?
Sponsored by Banfield Pet Hospital
Behind every Batman, there is a Robin. Behind every Clark Kent, there is a Lois Lane. The same is true in veterinary medicine.
Behind every great veterinarian, there’s a credentialed veterinary technician (CVT) and a veterinary assistant. And although CVTs and veterinary assistants have different responsibilities, working alongside our veterinarians is critical to delivering high-quality, compassionate patient care. Most importantly, they can tackle a wide variety of more than 200 clinical and nonclinical tasks, helping share the workload and thus alleviate team burnout.
It’s no secret that there is a chronic shortage of CVTs and veterinary assistants—and that many are leaving the profession due to concerns about a lack of career development, empowerment, and compensation.1,2 According to research commissioned by Mars Veterinary Health, it would take more than 30 years’ worth of graduates to meet the 10-year industry need for CrVTs.3
This grim outlook fueled my desire to be part of the team at VCA Animal Hospitals and design a program to support these unsung heroes. Through this provocation, we aligned on our program’s purpose: to create clear career pathways for sustainable professional development at VCA and retain the CVTs and veterinary assistants who have otherwise felt undervalued within the veterinary profession.
Culture shift
My role is not very common in the veterinary profession, so I often have to explain to others what exactly a regional technician director does. My standard response is that I am responsible for the mentorship, leadership, and medical upskilling of CVTs and veterinary assistants. My unique career journey was made possible by VCA, whose commitment to investing in its people is evidenced by the creation of roles like mine and supported by others who recognized the importance of the patient care perspective in leadership roles. As a result, I have developed a passion for the career development of CVTs and veterinary assistants.
As a former veterinary assistant and CVT, I was fortunate to have opportunities to grow professionally and to have a mentor who guided and encouraged me in my first supervisor job. But my professional journey was not without its challenges.
Although it was not easy, I loved and respected the path I needed to take to get to where I am today. If you were a CVT who wanted to advance, that was the way to do it. Because the veterinarians I worked with did not have the CVT point of view, professional development involved a lot of self-guided learning. When upward mobility is limited, knowledge becomes power, and competition can hinder learning opportunities and collaboration. Not everyone could have endured my career path.
Thankfully, the culture has shifted quite a bit in recent years. It is an exciting time to work in patient care, and it will only get better as veterinary technicians are increasingly allowed and empowered to practice at the top of their license and advance within the profession.
As part of the multidisciplinary team at VCA, I helped develop the career progression program.4 At its core, this program formally recognizes the skills of our nearly 14,000 CVTs and veterinary assistants while advancing their knowledge and skills through career development. By assigning career levels based on essential responsibilities, knowledge, and tactile and critical thinking skills, the program helps form a transparent career trajectory for our associates. This is huge for our profession.
Although many factors are at play, we know that opportunities for advancement and better pay are key reasons CVTs and veterinary assistants leave the profession. The career progression program creates a supportive, collaborative environment where CVTs and veterinary assistants can grow and thrive across clinical roles. The program is not a cookie-cutter approach with narrowly defined roles at each level— everyone’s career path is different based on their interests and goals, and the program is already opening doors to new ways of supporting veterinary medicine.
Having patient care representatives share their perspectives and expertise as part of a leadership team is extremely valuable, and these roles are becoming more common. For example, within VCA’s North Atlantic Group, the senior vice president of hospital operations and 3 regional operations directors started their careers as CVTs or veterinary assistants.
Teaching professional skills
Patient care is not just a job; it’s a career. CVTs and veterinary assistants work with veterinarians as part of a team, and we each have our own responsibilities when it comes to providing care. The only way we will be able to keep up with the growing demand for care is to enable and empower our CVTs to work at the top of their license and our veterinary assistants to perform at the top of their skills; this includes teaching professional skills.
Through my involvement with the Association of Veterinary Technician Educators, I have had the pleasure of speaking with and presenting to many program directors from colleges and universities with veterinary technician programs. One thing I always emphasize is the importance of making interpersonal skills part of their curriculum.
Developing and growing these skills, which encompass leadership skills, clinical communication, and emotional intelligence, helps everyone in a patient care position, regardless of their desire to grow into a leadership role. For example, all CVTs and veterinary assistants need to communicate well—within their teams and with clients—yet few technician programs offer this training. The good news is that we can teach and nurture these skills on the job through mentorship programs, internal training, and classes and seminars offered within and outside the veterinary profession.
It is gratifying to help bring much-needed solutions to CVTs and veterinary assistants. I look forward to seeing how the profession evolves as we create sustainable career paths for these critical roles. As our patient care teams are the largest subset of the veterinary workforce and vital partners in patient care, investing in them only stands to improve patient care in our hospitals, now and in the future
References
- Stay, please: a challenge to the veterinary profession to improve employee retention. American Animal Hospital Association. 2024. Accessed September 11, 2024. hubspotusercontent-na1.net/hubfs/24051120/Stay_Please_ AAHA_Retention_Study_2024_02182024.pdf
- Lederhouse C. Study: fair pay, appreciation for work top factors in employee retention. American Veterinary Medical Association. March 4, 2024. Updated May 2, 2024. Accessed September 11, 2024. average%20annual%20turnover%20rate,AAHA)%2C%20 told%20AVMA%20News.
- Tackling the veterinary professional shortage. MARS Veterinary Health. August 2023. Accessed September 11, 2024. tackling-the-veterinary-professional-shortage/
- VCA Animal Hospitals’ career progression program empowers 14,000+ credentialed veterinary technicians and veterinary assistants. News release. VCA Animal Hospitals. October 20, 2023. Accessed September 11, 2024. press-center/vca-news/career-progression-program
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