It is common knowledge that being veterinarian is no easy feat. It could be almost equated to a calling since it is not a field for the faint-hearted. To begin with, vet schools only admit the brightest and well-rounded candidates who can be trained easily.
The Association of American Veterinary Medical Colleges asserts that the nation has a mere 30 vet schools where over 3,000 students graduate every year. It is not easy to be admitted in a school of veterinary medicine. Medical students in the U.S. are many, but this specific field requires rigorous vetting and high grades for one to be considered a bona fide student of any vet college.
It is quite expensive to be studying vet medicine. It is a time-consuming exercise that requires a lot of patience and determination. Many a time, students have to give repeated attempts in order to succeed in being admitted in veterinary colleges. But, wait: Apart from having a rough time trying to study the seemingly difficult course, what does the life of a veterinarian look like? Does the vet doctor have his/her own free time? Or, is it all about books and animals only? We shall explore the intricate details of a veterinarian’s life in this article.
A veterinarian career is overtly demanding and challenging, but highly rewarding as well. Most of the vet doctors will admit this. For one to be successful in the field, one must have admirable interpersonal skills, possess unmatched work ethics, and have a deep interest and passion for animals.
Advantages Of Being A Vet Doctor
- Passion drives you more
- It is fulfilling and rewarding to diagnose and treat animals
- Excellent medical coverage
Disadvantages Of Being A Vet Doctor
- Animals protest since they do not like being taken to a vet. You could get kicked, scratched, or bitten
- The human caretakers are sometimes emotional, difficult, or, even, neglectful at times
Most of the people who are vet doctors today developed the interest for animals early in their lives. They love animals so much that they would never want to see them suffer. Amanda Wong, a student at the University of California Berkeley, in an interview with ValuePenguin, says, I have always maintained a fascination with animals from a young age and I knew I wanted to pursue a career that works closely with animals. Pursuing veterinary medicine became the obvious choice for me early-on.”
One of the greatest challenges that vet doctors have to face is the caretaker or owner of the animal that is brought for treatment. Some caretakers, pet parents, or farm owners are just not easy to deal with. This is the reason why a vet medicine doctor is required to have unmatched interpersonal skills. While some of the caretakers can be extremely over-cautious and worried for their pets, some can be neglectful, unpleasant, or irrational a common thing the vet doctors go through.
Vet Practitioner
Being a vet practitioner is not an easy task. It exposes the doctor to potential burnout due to spending long hours at work. The work is synonymous to that of being an investigator. A veterinarian must be able to perform intuitive interviews with caretakers, owners, or anyone who accompanies the animal to the clinic. He or she must have the ability to read the body language of the animal, and use rational tests and deductive reasoning to determine the best course of action for that specific animal.
In another interview to ValuePenguin Inc., Jennifer Livesay, a DVM student at the Oklahoma State University, says that a vet doctor has to be a jack-of-all-trades in order to be able to ascertain the exact illness that a given animal is suffering from. The caretaker may not be in a position to correctly read the symptoms of his or her animal, and neither the animals cannot verbalize their specific condition. Vet doctors perform intricate tests on animals in quest to trying to understand the illness the animal suffers from, she adds.
Many people think that veterinarian medicine is a private practice where the doctor deals with animals only. But the fact is it has vast scope other than just being a private practitioner. A degree in Doctor of Veterinary Medicine (DVM) is widely applicable in corporations, government institutions, and research centers. It is worth noting that the hours that a vet doctor spends at work may be gruelling. It is not easy to maintain a fixed daily routine of work since emergency calls are bound to happen when one least expects it.
