06/04/2025
Party Time!!!
We are celebrating that today, 6th April 2025, Pete, partner at PeRiHab, will have been a qualified veterinary surgeon for 35 years!
He originally studied at the Faculty of Veterinary Medicine, in Utrecht, The Netherlands, but soon after qualifying he moved to the UK. He worked as a mixed practice vet (just like his hero and inspiration James Herriot!) in Lincolnshire for 3 years, before moving to Kent, where he stayed for 25 years, at a large, independent practice. Since then, he has worked in Surrey and Sussex, in various practices, including the world-famous Fitzpatrick Referrals!
He has been an assistant vet, an associate vet, a director, a senior director, a lead vet, a clinical director and a partner, over those many years. Being a vet has always given him both pride and purpose and, even today, in the latter stages of his career, he is still enormously interested, ambitious, enthusiastic, passionate and caring in his dealings with all things veterinary, despite the ever-growing amount of red tape, H&S rules, management issues and paperwork.
He has always been keen to pass on knowledge and skills, be that to school pupils, vet school students, young graduates or foreign students, and teaching is one of his bigger passions. He started writing veterinary articles for the 'Louth Leader' in 1990, and has since written many articles for various veterinary and agility magazines, written a 'Vets and Pets' book, contributed to UK and USA agility websites, given countless presentations, presented several webinars on Webinar Vet and written many blogs for the PeRiHab website. He was also the British team vet for the agility world championships for 9 years, helping both dogs and their handlers stay fit and healthy.
He has seen (too) many things to remember, from the first dog and cat flea spot-on to the use of modern and safe anaesthetics, from smelly Guinea Pig mange dips to using Multi-parameter anaesthetic monitoring, from using Immobilon SA for his own dog to the use of CT and MRI scans at specialist referral centres, from stinky pig farm visits to the advent of corporate practice ownership, from having lunch with a farmer after two cow caesarean sections to treating monkeys from the local circus, from using a gutter to splint a broken leg in a calf to doing laparoscopy spays in dogs, from being chased by a German Shepherd dog to flicking a hamster when being bitten, from seeing a 80 kilogram St. Bernard straight after an 80 gram mouse, from helping with treating rhinos and cheetahs in South Africa to stapling a wound whilst sledding Huskies in the Arctic and much, much more!
But it hasn’t all been work and no play! Pete has done many trips abroad over the years, some of them simply holidays (including Western horse riding in Montana's Rocky Mountains of the USA, touring Europe and sailing around the Galapagos Islands) but also, not least, his many adventures raising money for charities, all over the world, from trekking the Namibian deserts, to climbing mountains like Kilimanjaro, from visiting the Arctic to the Antarctic, from Slovenian wild water adventures to Finnish ice climbing, from rafting the Yellowstone river to running a marathon in South Africa. He has done many triathlons, spent 15 years doing dog agility (leading to winning Crufts in 2001!), and until today still goes for the odd run or bike ride. He also loves cars and has driven the Nurburgring in a Porsche, steered supercars around the Top Gear track, driven around Europe many times and loves everything speed related! He also just loves walking the dog in the woods, currently little Spikey.
Pete could write a book full of stories of fun events, interesting cases, surprising outcomes, mishaps and problems, successes and mistakes, weird and wonderful patients and clients, laugh-out-loud moments, as well as extremely sad occasions and emotional turmoil. And who knows, one day, after retirement, he might still do that, like James Herriot before him.
Pete has done 4 official veterinary Certificate courses over the years and gained additional knowledge and expertise in various fields. One of these led to the start-up of PeRiHab - Mobile Canine Rehabilitation, with Rimante Butkute, his partner in business and in life, and his current biggest passion. Pete and Rimante are becoming ever more holistic and complementary in their vision and treatment of pets and are still learning new techniques, most recently including Western acupuncture, herbal/botanical medicine and the use of medicinal mushrooms. Watch this space for more new things to come!
In addition to running their Rehabilitation business, they both still work in general practice, as locum vets, treating small animals in local practices. Even though, sometimes, it is tempting to think about retirement, being a vet still gives Pete so much satisfaction, on a daily basis, that he can't see himself playing golf or doing gardening, so, for now at least, he will continue to try and give his best to all things veterinary, for a few years at least. Who knows what is next for Pete, Rimante and their pets Rocky and Spikey? There are still lots of adventures to come, for sure! 😊
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