Pandemic increase on Veterinary Crisis in Canada - Hanya Awan

During the past few years, the need to provide protection and safety for animals has risen by a huge amount, with the COVID-19 pandemic and many more unexpected factors contributing to the need to care for more species. With animals required to be adopted and shelters, that do not provide everything for these animals, medical assistance and checkups regularly are needed for the fundamental growth of an animal to ensure there are no life-impacting diseases affecting the animal. With the shortage of more veterinaries, animals have higher chances of developing infections and diseases that may cost their life. According to the AVMA Census of Veterinarians and Veterinary Practice Owners, veterinarians checked up with fewer patients and pets per hour and the average production time declined by nearly 25% in 2020, compared to 2019. During the pandemic, the challenges faced by veterinarians increased as more of them faced struggles of seeing less patience and having less success in their business. During the pandemic, veterinarians were only allowed to check up on emergency species or important surgeries that were needed. After the pandemic, pet owners started returning to their normal routine and began booking appointments with higher chances of their pets developing infections.

While the staff members of an animal care hospital may have been thrilled to gain more patients back, there were many changes to the new COVID-19 working restrictions. From splitting staff members into rotating teams, and sanitizing examination rooms and other surfaces throughout the clinic between visits. These are just a few changes on how that impacted the practices and normal routine of the staff members working to perform their best. Stressful changes and constant rotations or interruptions from COVID-19 restrictions within their work area, it has resulted in many losses of staff members. The reasons may vary, from the team member calling in sick, required to quarantine, required to stay home to care for their child or personal reasons. Animal hospitals and faculties with few staff members and lower numbers of veterinarians only made the initial challenging situation worse. In addition, the fact is known that higher turnover and loss of job positions have an impact on the team’s efficiency and productivity. Employee turnover rates are very high amongst the veterinary workforce, especially compared to other health care departments and categories. In fact, the average turnover for veterinarians is twice as high as it is for physicians in medical practice.

This ongoing issue does impact the flow of the workforce and the overall performance that is needed to ensure the immunity of animals that are brought in by owners. In addition to affecting the animals being cared for, as efficiency is not the main initiative of team members, it can also stress the employees caring for the animals when they are switching stations and tasks constantly. We can resolve the issue of turnovers by providing innovative and lasting approaches that improve working conditions and prevent veterinarians from leaving, and we can improve animal care to ensure their safety and health through technology machines and team bonding.