Veterinary medicine is a rewarding career. I have the privilege of caring for and helping pets every day. It is fun.

It also is stressful.

The profession sometimes is idealized in the public’s mind as a dream job in which one is paid to play with (and heal) dogs and cats. But there are aspects of veterinary medicine that aren’t a dream come true. Some pets don’t realize that the veterinary team is trying to help them. These animals may bite or scratch out of fear. Others are sick and can’t control their bowels or bladder. My clothing has been soiled by urine and feces countless times.

No reasonable person can blame an animal for being scared at the vet’s office, or for being too sick to control its bowels or bladder. But there are other forms of stress. Sometimes financial constraints make it impossible for vets to provide the best level of care. In other cases, we are able to run all of the necessary tests and perform all of the necessary treatments, yet our patients don’t get better.

Clients may be rude, surly, or even intoxicated. They sometimes threaten to sue if their animal does not make a complete recovery, but then forbid the attending veterinarian to treat the animal appropriately.

Hours generally are long. Remuneration is poor when compared with doctors who are trained to treat only one species.

Don’t get me wrong. Being a veterinarian is a great job. Becoming a vet is worth the effort. But veterinary medicine is a lot of work, and it can be stressful.

According to an article published recently in DVM Newsmagazine, some veterinarians handle the stress in an unhealthy way.

Job stress puts veterinarians at risk of binge drinking, drug use, study says

Hamburg, Germany — Veterinarians experience a high degree of psychosocial stress and demoralization linked to factors such as long hours with little free time, tough clients and difficulty balancing their private and professional lives, according to a team of researchers in Germany.
The group’s findings, based on a questionnaire answered by 1,060 practicing veterinarians in northern Germany in 2006, were published in BioMed Central’s latest Journal of Occupational Medicine and Toxicology, a peer-reviewed, open-access online journal.

Psychosocial stress among the respondents increased in proportion to work-related problems and lack of personal and family time, with many showing classic signs of demoralization, such as lack of optimism, dissatisfaction and little confidence or pride in themselves, said the researchers, led by Melanie Harling, from the Institution for Statutory Accident Insurance and Prevention in Hamburg.

The study also found complex links between the work stress and drug use, binge drinking and tobacco use. Practicing veterinarians were more frequently affected by work-related stress and were at greater risk of alcohol or drug consumption than those in non-clinical settings, such as industry or the public sector, the authors found.

Does this mean that your vet is an alcoholic or a drug addict? Of course not. I’m not convinced that vets have higher rates of substance abuse than members of other stressful professions (the article mentions nothing about lawyers, dentists, or “real” doctors, but I’ll bet that the rates are similar). I have known a few vets who had problems, but they have been few and far between.

Nonetheless, it is food for thought.

Photo credit: Ken30684. Photo license: CC.

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• UC Davis Alumni Magazine Reports on an Endangered Species: Male Vets

The face of veterinary medicine has changed dramatically in little more than a generation. Until the 1950s, almost all veterinarians were men. In fact, many vet schools refused to admit women in the 1930s and 1940s.

The proportion of women graduating from veterinary school has gradually increased since the 1950s, and women now make up the overwhelming majority in all veterinary programs in the USA. Some veterinary schools purportedly have entering classes that contain no men at all.

The winter, 2009 issue of UC Davis Magazine reports on the situation at my alma mater.

[S]tudents in the D.V.M. program and a popular pre-vet undergraduate major are now 80 percent female.

That ratio at the School of Veterinary Medicine is a complete reversal from 35 years ago, when four out of five students were men.

Reasons for the increase in women, many veterinarians and students say, include declining discrimination, flexibility in work schedules, a shift in the profession from livestock to family pet care and better drugs and handling techniques that make physical strength less important. The decline in men may reflect salaries, which the veterinary association says were right behind those of doctors in the 1970s but are now about 60 percent of physicians’ average pay.

The demographic shift in veterinary medicine is obvious to everyone in the field. Most days I am the only male working in the office–all of the other vets and all of the receptionists, assistants and nurses generally are female.

Despite the speculation in the article, nobody truly understands why the gender balance has shifted in such an extreme way. I believe one of the reasons listed in the quote above is especially dubious. Comparing veterinarians to physicians is comparing apples to oranges–no vet I have met ever considered becoming a “real” doctor, and vice-versa. Also, it should be noted that most medical school programs are overwhelmingly female too.

Some in the profession blame the gender shift for the declining veterinary salaries mentioned in the article. I am very skeptical about that claim. In my experience the vets holding down salaries tend to be older and set in their ways. Those vets are mostly men.

Although the causes of veterinary medicine’s gender shift are unknown, I do believe that the extreme nature of the shift is bad for the profession. Just as our profession was weaker and less balanced when not enough women were in it, so it will be when there are not enough men.

Photo Credit: Andrew Dunn. Photo license: CC.

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• How’s Your Vet’s Mental Health? (Part One)