08/07/2025
Why be a vet at CVVC?
(3-minute read, skip to bottom for TL;DR)
Picture this. You show up to work and you are scheduled for routine surgeries in the morning and regular appointments in the afternoon (after your 1 hour scheduled lunch break). You are scheduled for 4 routine cat spays in the morning. One has cancelled overnight so you have 3. Your techs and assistants have already admitted and checked in your surgeries before you arrived at work. You put your coffee and personal belongings on your desk, review any notes you have from clients (today there are none) and make your way to the kennel room to check your surgical patients.
You are greeted warmly by your surgery team. The techs tell you that one owner would like dewormer and one of the others would like flea and tick treatment and optional sedation for recovery. The last spay has a hernia that the tech has found. You do your presurgical exams, confirm the hernia on one cat, discover dirty ears on another, approve them for our protocoled premeds, and ask your techs to call the owners to get approval for the hernia repair for one and ear swabs, flush and medication for the other. The techs gladly get to work drawing up your premeds and making the requested phone calls and the assistants are busy setting up surgical prep and supplies while you head back to your desk.
While your team is prepping your surgeries you use this time to start your surgical notes, prescribe the requested and protocoled medications, and check your emails. You return a couple of calls from emails you had from clients, and delegate a couple more to the techs. Updates on cases mostly, booked yourself one follow-up for next week for an ear exam you saw last week. Your name pages over the intercom, they are ready for you in surgery. When you arrive to start your pre-op scrub, you see your surgical team in surgery with your first patient ready to go. They have an IV catheter placed, fluids are running (as per our protocol for all surgery patients), the patient is intubated and at an adequate plane of anesthesia, they are taking the vitals and have already completed the surgical prep scrub. Your packs are open and ready to receive you. You don your gown with the help of your assistant. Your tech does your pre-surgery check-in and confirms the name and procedure and any anesthetic concerns they have and say they are ready to go. This cat was the hernia add-on patient, and the tech informs you that the client was appreciative of the call and approved the additional procedure. You complete the spay and hernia and as you are throwing in your last stitch you see that your next patient is ready to receive you on the other surgery table for your next cat spay. You change gowns and off you go, seamlessly as the first.
There are now rumblings that one of the other appointments being seen by your co-associate vet has eaten a sock 3 days ago and is vomiting frequently, this dog requires a laparotomy. You know you have extra time in your surgery schedule and love to do ex-laps so you offer your services. Your co-vet is elated and offers the procedure to the clients promptly. The clients are so appreciative of the opportunity and agree to go in as soon as you are done with your spays. Your medical team have already done the bloodwork, xrays and iv fluids running by the time you catch wind of it. Your surgical team preps for the upcoming ex-lap. There is a little break between your cat spays and ex-lap that you use to drink your coffee, finalize your notes, complete your prescriptions (that are printed off and filled by the pharmacy tech), and review the xrays and medical notes of your ex-lap. Your co-vet fills you in on all the case details. You are paged to surgery where you scrub in and prepare to save a life. You don't think you need one but a tech isn't too far away if you require a surgical assistant. You find the culprit. A sock stuck in the small intestine. The color of the intestine indicates that you made it to surgery in good time and the patient only requires an enterotomy. You close up your patient and your team confirms post-op instructions and does the rest of the recovery, your patient wakes up comfortably. You finish up your notes, pass the case back to the vet that originally admitted the case, and just like that, it's lunchtime. You leave the clinic to run some errands, knowing they won't need you for an hour.
Your afternoon starts off with a new client/puppy vaccine. The clinic does this thing called puppy/kitty boards so you take the baby to the treatment room where there are several ooo-ing helpers to finish that up for you. You see an acute ear appointment (techs take ear swabs and run those for you promptly and fill and go over your medications with the owner), a lethargic, overweight, elder Shih-Tzu that you diagnosed with diabetes (tech takes blood and runs it promptly and after giving the results to the owner you send in our tech that loves doing diabetes talks), 2 more > 7-year dog vaccines (because our techs now do a lot of the < 6-year vaccines under PO doctor supervision), and a recheck you had scheduled to check on a laceration incision from a week ago. It looks amazing. You get to vet your way, with Spectrum of Care medicine as you are a doctor, not a production asset. You've been booked appropriately so you've had ample time to do your case workup and notes as you've gone along. Plus, notes are a breeze with the clinic funded dictation software of your choice. It's 5 pm and you are out of here.
Today was a good day, in a good environment, and today you saved a life or two.
TL;DR
At Cypress View Veterinary Clinic (CVVC), your day starts with coffee, 3 routine cat spays (prepped and admitted by techs), and minor additional treatments like ear care and a hernia repair, all coordinated efficiently by your team. While your surgical patients are being prepped, you handle notes, prescriptions, and client calls.
You seamlessly complete your spays, then jump into an emergency ex-lap for a sock-eating dog, thanks to a well-oiled team already running diagnostics and prep. You remove the sock, the dog recovers well, and it’s off to lunch.
Afternoon includes well-paced appointments: a new puppy visit, diabetic diagnosis, senior vaccines, and a laceration recheck, all supported by capable techs. You wrap up your notes as you go, and by 5 PM, you're done.
A productive, fulfilling day. Great teamwork, great outcomes, and you even saved a life.
We are proud to say this is the simplest summary of a typical day here at CVVC. We grow and support vets here. Nothing makes us happier than seeing our vets sparkle and do what they have wanted to do since they were kids, help animals!
If you are considering a change in workplace, consider us and Medicine Hat! Message us to set up a virtual coffee or supper (Starbs or Skip/DoorDash on us) to see if we can be a good fit for you!
If you have any questions for us, don't hesitate to email the millennial manager at [email protected]!
