Anything For Animals

posted by admin on Jun 30

Find an event being promoted locally by your ever present, ever active veterinary nurse!

People don’t always understand the important roles played by a veterinary nurse as part of a surgery and the community.  Many think that they are only there to ‘hold an animal still’ for the vet, or to clean up any surgery ‘mess’ after an operation or toilet ‘accident’.

However, you would be quite surprised as to how much of everything that vet nurses actually do!

The Reception:
Many surgeries have their nurses on the reception desk to answer all queries as customers call in or visit on foot.  They are fully aware of how all the computer systems work and so can access all animal records to give the best information at any time.

The Practice Building:
Unless they employ an external company, the vet nurses will be responsible for all the cleaning of the waiting room, offices and kitchen areas to make sure that no unnecessary bacteria or germs are lurking around the corridors - bearing in mind most of the patients are coming in sick already!

The Surgery Itself:
All vet nurses play a huge part in all surgery activities.  Not only are they in charge of all the supplies and the equipment - they are the anaesthetists too!  They must help to assess the patient before, during and after surgery - as well as make sure that they vets themselves can operate smoothly.

The Patients:
All surgeries have kennels for the sick, injured or operated on animals of all shapes and sizes.  The nurse will need to be aware of the needs and requirements of all the species present, including rodents, birds, reptiles and larger pets too - and how to care for them when they are ill.

Many surgeries offer overnight and emergency care, so the nurses may well have to work through the night in special instances focussing all their time on particular cases and making sure that they are aware of all emergency procedures in case of any problems while the vets are not onsite. 

The Medication:
They will no doubt have to be aware of all the medications in the surgery, what they are used for, when and how long they are used for and their use by dates.  And most importantly - when to not use them!  They will need to fulfil prescriptions from the vet and regular patients as well as make sure that enough supplies are kept on site.

Ongoing Training:
Most vet nurses will also be studying for further qualifications - and many vet nurses are in training on site (stripy green and white top means they are in training - solid green means qualified).  But also all qualified nurses still wish to improve their skills and take on a specialism or 2 depending on the surgery they work in.

Additional Activities:
Many surgeries will also offer non-illness related events on site, like puppy parties, weight loss clinics and other specifics.  They need to organise and advertise all these events themselves and learn all the new skills required to offer such advice.

They will no doubt also be responsible to the information and decoration of the waiting room notice boards - targeting the most relevant events to their clients or due to the time of year - like bonfire night problems and obesity or rabbit vaccinations etc.

Many vet nurses offer their skills to charity abroad, like neutering programs in South America or vaccination schemes in Africa - it’s not all puppies and bunnies! And, no doubt many are now using their skills to improve their company website too.

So, never under-estimate your local vet nurse when you see her cleaning the floor or bringing you a worming tablet - without them, your surgery would not function for more than 5 minutes!