Veterinarians in the United States undergo rigorous vetting and testing before they can be confirmed to be ready for veterinary medicine practice. This is because the federal government takes the course with deadly seriousness since there are very few veterinary doctors who have world-class training. In order to avoid disappointments in the field, the government has established various pathways to be passed by those who have interest in the course. Foreigners who desire to practice veterinary medicine in the United States, however, have a different program that they have to go through. One cannot practice directly if they have not been trained as per the guidelines of the U.S. government.
Program for the Assessment of Veterinary Education Equivalence
The Program for the Assessment of Veterinary Education Equivalence (PAVE) is the pathway that has been set out by the government for all foreign veterinary doctors to pass through before they can be allowed to practice in the States. The graduates must be from international universities and they must have studied the basics of veterinary medicine, even though this will be repeated once they are accepted in PAVE. The main role that PAVE plays is ascertaining that these foreign students have been trained well and that they are ready to practice either in the public or private sector. PAVE does all this on behalf of the participating AAVSB Member Boards.
In order to successfully apply for the PAVE full program, an applicant is required to fill an online form, print it, and deliver the hard copy before the given deadline. All applications are received as per the guidelines given. You, as the applicant, are required to pay attention to the stipulated deadline since PAVE does not, in any way, accept late submissions. An application cannot be considered as complete if all requirements of documentation are not fulfilled.
How To Pay PAVE Payments
PAVE accepts various modes of payment such as American Express, MasterCard, and Visa. If you use online payment methods such as PayPal or Payoneer, you are required to get authorization first before you can proceed to use the said online means. You must pay the original fee before your application is accepted. The fee comprises of qualifying science examination fee and application fee. The PAVE board does accept cash money neither does it accept applications made without the receipt to show that you paid the initial fee. This is to ensure that the applicants who access the program are serious about the step that they are taking. PAVE advises applicants to get the correct advice before enrolling for the program. However, no matter the kind of advice that a foreign student receives, the PAVE program is an inevitable process.
After you make the payments and are ready for the process, ensure that you have each and every document ready with you before the deadline. AAVSB offices do not entertain lateness neither do they encourage complacency in the applications. The PAVE application fee for the September 2017 exam is $375 while the qualifying science examination fee is $1500.
After you have submitted each required document online, the documentation is required to be mailed to the given
email address. You do not have to send all the documents together. The posted application deadline is the date by which you should ensure that you have sent all your documents. All potential candidates are then requested to send their personal details on the email address pave@aavsb.org, stating when they will send their documents over and when it is that they expect to apply for the program.
Taking PAVE Examinations
The PAVE qualifying exam tests fundamental skills in the veterinary field that one is required to know, irrespective of the place of study. Every PAVE candidate must sit for the qualifying science examination. The exam covers pre-clinical and basic subjects that were taught in the initial three years of the curriculum. The curriculum must come from the accredited veterinary institutions. The exam is offered three times every year, i.e. in September, in January, and in May. The qualifying science exam has a total of 200 multiple-choice questions that are delivered from the specified areas in veterinary medicine. The exam is done in one block, and it takes a total of 220 minutes. There is no break in between. Anatomy covers 10% of the exam, physiology covers 15%, pharmacology covers 13%, diagnostics covers 22%, surgery covers 12%, medicine, ethics and communications cover 15%, and preventative medicine and public health cover 13%. From this breakdown, one can see that all sub-topics in the field are equally important. This is because PAVE does not want a situation whereby there are veterinarians with half-baked knowledge. After all, animals, too, cannot be exposed to doctors who are not well-qualified.