VPN Plus+ ExclusiveSurviving a pandemic as a veterinary professionalJune 24, 2020By Patty Khuly, VMD, MBAIf you're a veterinary professional and you feel like you're being squeezed from every direction, welcome to my pandemic-warped world. It's gotten so bad that sometimes I feel like a Cuban sandwich, all thin slices of ham, cheese, baby pork, and pickles smushed between two halves of buttered baguette, which is then compressed by an industrial press so powerful the edges of the bread burn and the cheese sizzles while the bread soaks up the excess. Further indulge my Miami metaphor by envisioning our suppliers as the bottom half and elite specialty providers as toppers. We, the tender baby pig (arguably the least equipped to tolerate the pressures), are becoming but a smear of protein. To be sure, it's delicious in the end. Nevertheless, it's still kind of sad the bread ends up with more than its share of all the butter. Culinary fantasies notwithstanding, it's clear things are getting tougher for the average veterinary practice. Increased ER income is keeping specialty services humming, while as many as a third of the practices in my area have temporarily shuttered, possibly never to reopen. This rearranged game board has given an edge to the larger, more established practices, along with …
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A veterinary meditation: Sources of hope in the midst of an outbreakJune 17, 2020In uncertain times, a fundamental human tendency is to project into the future and foresee the adversity that lies ahead. Some of us go straight to catastrophe, while others experience a more nebulous dread.
Off Leash: Stalking stigmaMarch 3, 2020Eighteen years ago, Patty Khuly realized she had a problem. Anxiety, depression, and a family history of mental illness conspired with the stress of divorce, debt, and single motherhood to feed a cycle of self-medication with alcohol and prescription drugs.
Eight (more) management mistakes to avoidJanuary 3, 2020Rather than learning from experience and making mistakes yourself, studying other leaders’ and managers’ blunders can help save you time and energy.
The tuition-debt crisis: Who is willing to change?July 22, 2019At the end of my career, it is perplexing to look back 60 years—with what passes for the wisdom of old age—to make comparisons with the contemporary scene. To be sure, during my lifetime the veterinary profession achieved major scientific and technological progress, and survived several episodes of political and economic uncertainty. Yet, who can say there may not be worse to come? In my view, the most serious threat to the long-term prosperity of the veterinary profession is the damage now being caused by out-of-control educational costs and student debt. We seem to have lost our moral compass. By the numbers Incurring a moderate amount of educational debt to achieve a professional degree is a worthy investment; however, veterinary education has become prohibitively expensive. According to the 2018-2019 Association of American Veterinary Medical Colleges' (AAVMC's) annual report,1 the national median tuition for in-state veterinary students is $31,900 and for out-of-state students it is $52,600. The mean veterinary educational debt is $174,000. With starting salaries averaging in the low $70s, the debt-to-income ratio is approximately 2.4:1 (double the 1.2:1 figure of just a decade ago). One hesitates to invoke the hyperbole of "crisis;" however, student debt is an enormous drag, …
Our biggest mistakes and the lessons we learnMay 27, 2019Is there ever a day when you don't make a mistake? Sometimes it's as tiny as Cheyletiella; other times, it looms as large as a pachyderm. A classmate and friend of mine from the Washington State University College of Veterinary Medicine Class of 1980, the late Drew Turner, DVM, had a well-known father who was a beloved pastor from a large church in Seattle. A popular Seattle Times religion columnist and a gifted speaker, the Reverend Dale Turner had a quote about mistakes that I kept inside my day planner: "It is the highest form of self-respect to admit our errors and mistakes, and make amends for them. To make a mistake is only an error in judgment, but to adhere to it when it is discovered shows infirmity of character." I recently made a major mistake. Not my first, but one of my worst, and especially egregious because of the increased awareness of the pressures our profession faces and the problems of depression and suicide. An honest mistake I'm a voracious reader and consumer of news. I forward the links to as many as a dozen pet or veterinary-related articles to my trusted decades-long communications director every day. …
Is it time we change our tune on telemedicine?May 24, 2019At some point, our profession got it into its collective head to start hating on telemedicine. Perhaps it was the image of non-veterinarians armed with third-tier vet tech degrees hunched over laptops banging out answers to questions they have no business fielding. And in their pajamas, no less! It's a mental picture my state's association—the Florida Veterinary Medical Association (FVMA)—is advancing this legislative season, as it seeks to limit telemedicine's reach into Sunshine State living rooms. And Florida is by no means alone in its quest to curb the telemedicine industry's growth. Most other state associations also are seeking a legislative solution to the perceived threat posed by online veterinary services. Telemedicine was front and center at American Veterinary Medical Association's (AVMA's) House of Delegates (HOD) meeting in January, the findings of which they'll likely present at this summer's conference in Washington, D.C. These are the best minds our profession has at its disposal, grappling with issues as fundamental as the nature of the veterinarian-client-patient-relationship (VCPR). It all comes down to the hands In its wariness of telemedicine, professional organizations like AVMA and state veterinary medical associations (VMAs) argue the definition of VCPR is at the heart of the …
What happens when big veterinary merges with big dataMay 7, 2019It's not just Facebook and Google. It's also Big Veterinary Supplier, Inc. What do I mean by that? Data is a huge source of income for all three. So much so, they're making use of private information we diligently collect and, in some cases, they're using it to compete directly against us. Veterinarians are not immune As our industry becomes increasingly consolidated, it's also adopting some of the habits with which other industries are plagued. In the case of data mining, it seems they're getting more aggressive about it, and seemingly less likely to back down when confronted with evidence of their transgressions. Here's a recent example of what happened at my clinic: Until recently, I was the reluctant user of a large-scale online pharmacy, which was integrated into my clinic's website. In return for a small commission, I'd send my clients to this site when they expressed interest in buying products or medications online. To be clear, I knew the Faustian bargain I was entering into: My clients were theirs to contact and do business with for as long as I said it was OK. My reasoning was that I'd be losing out on these sales anyway. I …
Nine tips for tidying up our practices this yearApril 17, 2019If it doesn't bring you joy… throw it out. It's an inexplicably alluring (if slightly depressing) code to live by. Championed by professional organizer Marie Kondo in her wildly successful book, The Life-Changing Method of Tidying Up, the eponymous KonMari approach to organization urges us all to examine the impulses tethering us to things that don't really matter. Among other human urges that define spring as a season (procreation comes to mind), the drive to reestablish control over our lives plays a prominent role in our culture. Maintaining our homes and workplaces clean, tidy, and ordered represents a psychological thawing of our winterized brains and a resurrection of our normal daily activities. We as veterinary professionals experience much the same as it applies to our workplaces. As the busier seasons approach, many of us take stock of what we have and seek to improve our environment. Tidying up à la KonMari, with an eye toward getting rid of what doesn't serve us, is how I'm managing my life this year. To that end, here are this year's things to tackle and tips for tidying, as I seek to tame the chaos that inevitably builds over the previous year. 1) …
Why LGBTQ-friendly is business-friendly and good karma, tooMarch 22, 2019I'm one of those people whose hatchback is decorated with pet-themed bumper stickers—everything from Malinois silhouettes and silly cat faces to a cheeky "pugs not drugs" decal. To wit, my collage has never elicited anything but positive commentary in parking lots and driveways. It was only when I added one simple "equal" sign (you know the one, yellow on blue) that my cute and cuddly spread attracted any negativity. It happened in a Target parking lot during the holidays. The guy put his pickup in park behind my vehicle, exited his car and brachiated his disapproval––up close. "Learn how to drive, you f-ing liberal!" (For the record, he used the whole uncensored expletive along with a degree of hostility I hardly deserved.) Now, I may or may not have taken the parking space he was hoping I'd overlook, but that kind of thing only happens when you've touched more than just the "girl-got-your-spot" nerve. This guy probably does not like gay people––or anyone who likes gay people, for that matter. Which got me to thinking about my practice. At each of our two glass-doored entrances, I've affixed a similar gold-on-blue sticker next to our Yelp decal and the one …
