This year’s theme is appropriately titled “resilience”, as the after effects of the pandemic and recent natural disasters exacerbate the daily pressures on vets.
With Australia in the coalface of bushfires, flooding and even mouse plagues, there has never been a greater need for the skilled expertise and care of vets who champion animal welfare and step up to the frontline during crisis.
To understand the scale of the issue, it is estimated there are:
• 13,951 vets in Australia vs 129,066 human doctors;
• 30.4 million pets vs 25.8 million people; and
• 2179 pets per veterinarian vs 200 patients per doctor.
With a severe skills shortage and an additional one million pets estimated to need care in Australia post-pandemic, Greencross Vets is seeking to raise greater public awareness of the challenges facing vets and drive change for vets globally.
As one of the largest veterinary providers in Australia, Greencross is committed to improving mental health support and is recognised as a Gold Level Skilled Workplace by Mental Health First Aid Australia.
Led by Adam Jadresic, Head of Health, Safety & Wellbeing, Greencross Vets has dedicated Mental Health First Aiders to ensure teams feel seen, heard and supported with any issue.
“Being a vet is one of the most rewarding jobs in the world — we came into this profession because we’re deeply passionate about animals and safeguarding them against illness,” Greencross Vets regional clinical director Adam Sternberg said.
In celebrating the remarkable work vets do this World Veterinary Day, here’s some surprising facts you may not know about vets:
1. Multi-species experts — vets are trained to medically treat not just one species, as with humans, but many different species and body systems.
2. All-in-one animal doctors, trained in many medical fields — while human medicine has dedicated specialists, general practice vets are masters of many fields.
3. Integral to animal welfare — vets play an important role in animal conservation and research, large or small.
4. Incredibly intuitive, their patients cannot say what’s wrong. Vets diagnose and treat their patients without any verbal explanation of their complex symptoms, pain points or progress.
5. Highly educated — they are knowledgeable and experienced as all vets undertake several years study, plus many vets study and undergo intensive training for many more years to become specialists across disciplines including surgery, oncology, ophthalmology emergency and critical care.
6. Remarkably skilled — they often have to remove strange and unexpected items from their patients’ throats and stomachs with precision and care, such as metal hooks, toys, sand, hair ties and even cutlery.
10°C