Central Line: The AAHA Podcast

Welcome to Central Line, the official podcast of the American Animal Hospital Association. We are so excited to bring you these conversations to help you and your entire team simplify your journey towards excellence – which we know encompasses so much more than the medicine. In each episode, our host, Dr. Katie Berlin, talks with thought leaders and experts in hospital management, workplace culture, mental health, communication, and, of course, patient care, for advice on tackling the most persistent pain points in veterinary medicine today. We hope veterinary professionals in all roles, from client care to practice owner, will enjoy and benefit from these conversations.

Join us as Central Line takes you to the heart of exceptional veterinary care.

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Guest: Danielle K. Lambert and Jessica Vogelsang, DVM

Episode Description:

Why, in a field that’s overwhelmingly female in 2023, is there still a gender pay gap? Danielle K. Lambert, CEO and cofounder of The Snout Group (https://thesnoutgroup.com/), joins AAHA’s chief medical officer, Jessica Vogelsang, DVM, to discuss how, as a profession, we can move toward a time when all women feel free to ask for what they’re worth. And in the meantime, we can speak up for each other.

People of any gender: take a listen, get inspired, and check out these resources:

• Feminist Fight Club by Jessica Bennett
• The Myth of the Nice Girl by Fran Hauser
• Women’s Veterinary Leadership Initiative (WVLDI)
• March 2023 article on the gender pay gap in AAHA’s Trends magazine

Find all of AAHA’s most up-to-date Guidelines, including resources for your clients and team, at aaha.org/guidelines.

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Guest: Marcy A. Bliss

Episode Description:

Our guest this week is Marcy A. Bliss. It’s pretty easy to take compounded drugs for granted... until things change. And change is in the air starting April 1, 2023, when the Food and Drug Administration’s Guidance for Industry #256 takes effect. GFI 256 will determine what medications veterinary teams are able to keep in their office stock for dispensing to individual patients – such as the bulk order of gabapentin marshmallow-flavored suspension many of us keep on the shelf to send home with those cats and small dogs who just aren’t up for a relaxed experience that day.

Marcy A Bliss, CEO of Wedgewood Pharmacy, joins us to talk about how GFI 256 will change how we use compounded meds, the long list of drugs Wedgewood and others have submitted for review by the FDA in the hopes of getting them approved for office stock, and how veterinarians can influence the FDA to move more drugs onto the “OK” list.

If you’re worried about losing immediate access to the drugs you need, take a few minutes to let the FDA know what drugs are important to you. This page has links to the approved list and the drugs still under review, and makes it easy to submit comments on GFI 256: https://info.wedgewoodpharmacy.com/gfi-comments

Find all of AAHA’s most up-to-date Guidelines, including resources for your clients and team, at aaha.org/guidelines.

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Guest: Ewan D. S. Wolff, PhD, DVM, DACVIM

Episode Description:

In this episode, Ewan D. S. Wolff, PhD, DVM, DACVIM, one of Pride VMC’s 2022 Leadership Award Winners, joins us for one of Central Line’s most important conversations to date. We cover a lot of ground and a lot of emotions, from how studying dinosaur diseases prepared them for a career in internal medicine to why they picked up their life and family and moved across the country in 2022 in the space of a few weeks.

We are living at a pivotal moment in our society’s story. Stop what you’re doing and learn what each of us can do to move the needle in the only direction that improves the safety, wellbeing, and diversity of our space – our profession – our people.

Pride VMC has an enormous library of resources for the entire veterinary community.

If you or someone you love need support, visit this list of hotlines and other resources: https://pridevmc.org/support/

Visit this page to learn more about and sign the Gender Identity Bill of Rights (GIBOR).
You can see the Gender Identity Guide (published along with the GIBOR).

We also discussed and recommended two programs available through the AVMA:
Journey for Teams (free)
Brave Space Certificate program (free for members)

Find all of AAHA’s most up-to-date Guidelines, including resources for your clients and team, at aaha.org/guidelines.

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Guest: Margot Vahrenwald, DVM

Episode Description:

“You can’t deliver great medicine if your team is not functioning properly,” says Margot Vahrenwald, DVM, current president of AAHA’s Board of Directors. Dr. Margot stopped in to chat during Connexity in fall 2022 as she stepped into her presidency, and she told us about all the things she’s excited to see come to life at AAHA and in the veterinary profession as a whole. She’s got a journalism degree and a master’s in communications, and her focus on words, relationships, and all the things that make up the framework of veterinary medicine is already serving us well in 2023.

Want to be on AAHA’s Board of Directors? Apply before March 27, 2023. We’d love to have a credentialed vet tech on the Board! More information and application instructions here: https://bit.ly/3SvrVaZ

Find all of AAHA’s most up-to-date Guidelines, including resources for your clients and team, at aaha.org/guidelines.

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Guest: Marci Kirk, DVM and Annie Chavent, DVM

Episode Description:

This week, Central Line is teaming up with the hosts of the AVMA’s podcast, My Veterinary Life, to talk about something we all have in common and that we get questions about all the time: nonclinical veterinary jobs.

Our guests, Marci Kirk, DVM, Associate Director, Office of the Executive Vice President, Annie Chavent, DVM, Assistant Director, Student Initiatives, and I chat about how we ended up in the positions we’re in, what our days look like, and how we’ve all discovered in our own way that love for vet med doesn’t always have to look the same.

Give My Veterinary Life a listen, and let us know if you’d like to hear more collaborative episodes with the hosts of MVL or other veterinary podcasts

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Guest: Jessica Vogelsang, DVM

Episode Description:

You may have heard us talking at AAHA about 2023 being “The Year of the Team” - a year to celebrate, elevate, and collaborate with each other, no matter what roles we play in the veterinary space. Joining us for the first time is Jessica Vogelsang, DVM, AAHA’s chief medical officer, author, gingerbread house maker, and beanhead (hear her out on this), who is behind this year’s team focus and hopes we can help shine a light on some of the many different ways veterinary teams can thrive.

February 14, 2023, is also launch day for this spring’s Veterinary Visionaries storytelling solving event! Tune in to learn more, or visit VeterinaryVisionaries.org to tell us your story and help change our world.

Find all of AAHA’s most up-to-date Guidelines, including resources for your clients and team, at aaha.org/guidelines.

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Guest: Addie Reinhard, DVM, MS

Episode Description:

In a relatively short time in veterinary medicine, Addie Reinhard, DVM, MS, has not only made an impact – she's galvanized the entire profession. As founder and CEO of MentorVet, she turned what she saw as a gap in the ecosystem into a full-on movement to improve, fortify, and redefine what mentorship looks like in vet med.

We caught up with her at Connexity last fall and can say one thing for certain: we’ll be hearing lots more from this movement-maker, and the profession will continue to be a better place because of her efforts.

Find all of AAHA’s most up-to-date Guidelines, including resources for your clients and team, at aaha.org/guidelines.

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Guest: Kathleen Cooney, DVM, MS, CHPV, CCFP

Episode Description:

It takes about 10 seconds of listening to Kathleen Cooney, DVM, MS, CHPV, CCFP, to figure out why she’s so good at what she does. Dr. Cooney, founder and director of education for the Companion Animal Euthanasia Training Academy (CAETA), made time during a busy workshop schedule at Connexity in fall 2022 to sit down with us and talk about making euthanasia one of the most beautiful parts of a day in vet med.

https://caetainternational.com/

Dr. Cooney was instrumental in creating AAHA's End-of-Life Care Accreditation and was on the task force that created the 2016 AAHA/IAAHPC End-of-Life Care Guidelines. We’ll be talking more with her later in 2023 – if you have a question about euthanasia or end-of-life care, drop us a line at [email protected] or ping us on social media.

Mentioned in this episode:
Euthabag: https://www.euthabag.com/

April 2022 Trends article on aquamation: https://www.aaha.org/publications/trends-magazine/trends-articles/2022/april-2022/f1-aquamation/

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Find all of AAHA’s most up-to-date Guidelines, including resources for your clients and team, at aaha.org/guidelines.

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Guest: Nicole Jameson Fritz, RVT, VTS (ECC)

Episode Description:

It’s easy to see why Nicole Jameson Fritz, RVT, VTS (ECC) is the inaugural winner of the AAHA Veterinary Technician of the Year award. Nicole is dedicated, curious, kind, and humble, and she’s been quietly growing, flourishing, and encouraging her team in the same hospital, Canada West Veterinary Specialists in Vancouver, for nearly three decades.

Nicole’s passion for her work and common-sense views on attracting, rewarding, and empowering her team make us excited to see what the future holds for her – although we’ll have to follow along closely as she’s definitely not in it for the spotlight.

Nominations for AAHA’s 2023 Veterinary Technician of the Year will open later this year – stay tuned and be thinking about those rock star credentialed technicians in your life.

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Find all of AAHA’s most up-to-date Guidelines, including resources for your clients and team, at aaha.org/guidelines.

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Guest: Mary Gardner, DVM

Episode Description:

Not many veterinary professionals would deny the unbridled joy of a new puppy or kitten visit. But it’s the complex emotions, accumulated experiences, and deeply rooted relationships (not to mention those wobbly legs and gray faces) that can make senior pet appointments the most rewarding and memorable of all.

Mary Gardner, DVM, author, innovator, and co-founder of Lap of Love, did us the honor of serving on the task force for the newly released 2023 AAHA Senior Care Guidelines, and in this episode she shares how veterinary teams in any field can make their practices more senior-friendly – and how we can harness the power of the gray muzzle/creaky cat advocates on our teams to take senior care and end-of-life care to the next level.

Find out more about Dr. Mary, including her newest books, It’s Never Long Enough and Nine Lives Are Not Enough, at drmarygardner.com.

Other books mentioned in today’s episode: Bittersweet: How Sorrow and Longing Make Us Whole, by Susan Cain, and When Breath Becomes Air, by Paul Kalanithi.

Read the brand new 2023 AAHA Senior Care Guidelines and associated resources FREE at aaha.org/senior-care – and check out all of AAHA’s most up-to-date Guidelines, including resources for your clients and team, at aaha.org/guidelines.

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Guest: Jules Benson, BVSc, MRCVS, AVP, and Emily Tincher, DVM

Episode Description:

You might be hearing the phrase “spectrum of care” quite a bit these days, and veterinary teams are used to thinking of vet care in terms of how close clients can get to the “gold standard” recommendation with the resources they have. Jules Benson, BVSc, MRCVS, AVP, chief veterinary officer at Nationwide Pet Insurance, and Emily Tincher, DVM, Nationwide’s senior director of veterinary relations, are on a mission to help teams provide the most appropriate care possible for every pet family by using an evidence-guided approach – not just to medicine, but to the communication around the care.

Learn more about Nationwide’s focus on spectrum of care here: https://www.petinsurance.com/veterinarians/spectrum-of-care/

Read more about spectrum of care in a monthly column in NEWStat by Kate Boatright, VMD. https://www.aaha.org/publications/newstat/articles/2022-11/why-do-we-need-to-talk-about-spectrum-of-care/

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Find all of AAHA’s most up-to-date Guidelines, including resources for your clients and team, at aaha.org/guidelines.

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Guest: Garth Jordan

Episode Description:

In this “Quick Hit from Connexity,” we catch up with Garth Jordan, AAHA’s CEO. Garth is the type of leader who welcomes one-on-one connection with his team, so it’s no surprise that he also sees connectedness as the way forward for veterinary medicine. This episode gets personal (you’ll know how Garth proposed to his wife by the end), and so are we this season – Veterinary Visionaries kicks off a new event in February, so stay tuned for more details.

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Episode Description:

As we say farewell to 2022, we’d like to leave you with a special episode featuring multiple guests – all of whom are working hard to leave veterinary medicine better than they found it. Enjoy these snippets from the conversations we had at Connexity this year, when we asked each guest, “What does a better world look like to you?”

Plus... stay tuned till the end for a few rare Central Line outtakes.

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Guests: Michael Shirley; Josh Vaisman, MAPPCP (PgD); Alyssa Mages, BS, CVT; Phil Richmond, DVM, CAPP, CPPC, CPHSA, CCFP; Garrott Van Bebber, DVM; Liz Van Bebber, DVM; Holly Hunt; Kortney Ellerbe; Niccole Bruno, DVM; Genine Ervin-Smith, DVM, MPH; Adam Hechko, DVM; Addie Reinhard, DVM, MS; Cheyanne Flerx; Emily Tincher, DVM; Jules Benson BVSc MRCVS; Garth Jordan, MBA, CSM, CSPO; Jennifer Bruns, DVM, MPVM; Kathleen Cooney, DVM, MS, CHPV, CCFP; Kathryn Primm, DVM; Kim Fish; Margot Vahrenwald, DVM; Omar Farias, VMD; Ryan Champagne 

Find all of AAHA’s most up-to-date Guidelines, including resources for your clients and team, at aaha.org/guidelines.

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Guest: Elizabeth Maxwell, DVM, MS, DACVS-SA, ACVS Fellow, Surgical Oncology, and Candice Manganaro, DVM

Episode Description:

If you've ever heard or thought things like, “Well, the specialist is just going to repeat all our diagnostics anyway,” “I don't want the ER vet to think I’m dumb,” or “Why do primary care vets always send us cases with no money?” this conversation is for you. Primary care practitioner Candice Manganaro, DVM, and Elizabeth Maxwell, DVM, MS, DACVS-SA, and ACVS Fellow in Surgical Oncology, current president of the Collaborative Care Coalition, chat about all the things primary care vet teams worry about when they refer patients to specialists... and what a collaborative specialist really thinks when you call for advice about a patient who will probably never darken the door of their hospital.

Learn more about how collaborative care benefits patients, clients, and veterinary teams – the data doesn’t lie! - at www.collaborativecarecoalition.org.

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Find all of AAHA’s most up-to-date Guidelines, including resources for your clients and team, at aaha.org/guidelines.

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Guest: Adam Hechko, DVM

Episode Description:

For some of us, the title “President of the Board” used to conjure up a formal, slightly aloof person in a stiff suit, but that image disappears when we meet AAHA’s humble and kind immediate past-president, Adam Hechko, DVM. He may have held the gavel at board meetings for the past year, but he probably won’t ever be able to watch this episode, and he’s surprised when people sign up to hear him talk – which they did, in droves, at his Connexity table talk.

Dr. Hechko took time out of his hectic conference schedule to talk about progress, experimentation, and what it means to him to “Create a Better World” in vet med.

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Find all of AAHA’s most up-to-date Guidelines, including resources for your clients and team, at aaha.org/guidelines.

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Guest: Cheyanne Flerx

Episode Description:

December always seems like a leaky vessel – there must be a hole somewhere that’s letting time get away from us so fast! We’ve got a short, sweet episode this week featuring Cheyanne Flerx, one of our speakers at Connexity 2022, who started out as a veterinary assistant and now runs her own business as a social media marketing educator and coach. We’re sure we’ll hear more from Cheyanne in the future, but for now, enjoy a quick hit of inspiration and encouragement from this self-taught social media maven with an unconventional origin story.

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Find all of AAHA’s most up-to-date Guidelines, including resources for your clients and team, at aaha.org/guidelines.

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Guest: Erin Frey, DVM, MPH, DACVPM and Jennifer Granick, DVM, MS, PhD, Diplomate ACVIM (SAIM)

Episode Description:

Our guests this week are Erin Frey, DVM, MPH, DACVPM, and Jennifer Granick, DVM, MS, PhD, Diplomate ACVIM (SAIM).

We all got into veterinary medicine to make a difference – for one animal at a time in most cases – and sometimes it can be hard to remember that the little things we do and recommend can make a world-changing difference. Erin Frey, DVM, MPH, DACVPM, chair of the task force behind the 2022 AAFP/AAHA Antimicrobial Stewardship Guidelines, and Jennifer Granick, DVM, MS, PhD, Diplomate ACVIM (SAIM), task force member, are here to remind us of the effect small actions can make in the face of a very, very big problem.

Whether it’s never skipping that ear cytology even if you’re running late, always having the conversation about topicals even when you’re not sure the client will say yes, or being the one to run the diagnostics even when they’re used to having refills approved sight unseen, Drs. Granick and Frey are quick to point out that every little bit helps – and when we know better, we can do better.

Check out all of UMN’s antimicrobial stewardship resources at ARSI.umn.edu, including their non-antibiotic prescription pad.

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Find all of AAHA’s most up-to-date Guidelines, including resources for your clients and team, at aaha.org/guidelines.

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Guest: Lynn Hendrix, DVM, CHPV

Episode Description:

As this episode is released, we’re heading into the winter holidays – a time, as all veterinary professionals know, often brings more than its share of sadness as well as joy.

Lynn Hendrix, DVM, CHPV, joins us this week (along with a very tiny, very sassy kitten called Pluto) to talk about something almost all vet teams do, and how she's helping to teach many of us to see it – and do it – differently.

Dr. Hendrix is a certified hospice and palliative veterinarian, new book author, former IAAHPC board member and co-author of the first IAAHPC guidelines, founder/owner of Beloved Pet Mobile Vet, VIN consultant, and founder of the Veterinarian Palliative Medicine group on Facebook.

https://www.belovedpetmobilevet.com/
https://www.facebook.com/groups/worldvetpalliativemedicine

Through her years shepherding families through loss, she’s learned more than a few lessons about, as she calls it, bridging the gaps – between life and death, between what people say and how we can help them, and between bad news and goodbye.

**Since we recorded, Dr. Hendrix’s book, Animal Hospice and Palliative Care for the House Call Veterinarian, has been published and is out in the world! You can buy it here! http://bit.ly/3X8c6sx

Learn more about the International Association for Animal Hospice and Palliative Care (IAAHPC) at https://iaahpc.org/.

This episode was produced with generous support from CareCredit.

This information is shared solely for your convenience. You are urged to consult with your individual advisors with respect to any information presented. Synchrony and its affiliates, including CareCredit, (collectively, “Synchrony”) makes no representations or warranties regarding this content and accept no liability for any loss or harm arising from the use of the information provided. All statements and opinions are the sole opinions of the speaker.

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Guest: Patty Lathan, VMD, MS, DACVIM and Renee Rucinsky, DVM, DABVP (Feline)

Episode Description:

Referring internal medicine cases isn’t always a straightforward decision. As clinicians, veterinarians can feel judged for referring cases others might handle themselves – and as veterinary team members, it can be hard to know what to tell clients when different doctors might handle the same case differently. This week’s guests, Patty Lathan, VMD, MS, DACVIM, and Renee Rucinsky, DVM, DABVP (Feline), share what makes a referral experience go smoothly – and why we don’t need to feel guilty for asking specialists to step in.

This episode is made possible with generous support from Boehringer Ingelheim Animal Health - and check out the two new resources we developed, also with their support, to help get your diabetic patients (and their families!!) through those tough first weeks.

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Find all of AAHA’s most up-to-date Guidelines, including resources for your clients and team, at aaha.org/guidelines.

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Guest: Niccole Bruno, DVM and Genine Ervin-Smith, DVM, MPH

Episode Description:

Niccole Bruno, DVM, took a personality test that told her, “You’re a visionary,” and we’re guessing no one who’s ever met Dr. Bruno would doubt it for a second.

The founder and CEO of BLEND stopped by to chat with us at Connexity this fall along with fellow changemaker Genine Ervin-Smith, DVM, MPH, BLEND’s Chief Operating Officer, and the two of them talked about how BLEND came to be, how they’re working to build a more diverse pipeline into veterinary medicine, and what it truly means to have an inclusive culture that fosters a sense of belonging for professionals from all communities. .

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Find all of AAHA’s most up-to-date Guidelines, including resources for your clients and team, at aaha.org/guidelines.

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Guest: David Berlin and Alexandra Bronson

Episode Description:

As veterinary professionals, we talk to clients all day – but in the thick of a busy day, it’s easy to forget what it’s like to be one of them. David Berlin and Alexandra Bronson, educators in the charter school system in Brooklyn, NY, join us to talk about their experience as “proud cat parents” of Audrey, who was diagnosed with diabetes mellitus in 2021.

They’ve navigated uncertainty, guilt, sadness, and Alex’s no-joke needle phobia to get Audrey into remission. Their experience helps remind all of us that there's always a full story happening across the exam table, and our role may be small, but it’s important that we play it with patience, empathy, and love.

This episode is made possible with generous support from Boehringer Ingelheim Animal Health.

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Guest: Coral Doherty, RVT

Episode Description:

When it comes time for radiographs, most of us put lead aprons on without thinking twice - but we don’t have a set of standards (or effective PPE!) to prevent the mental and emotional trauma for which all veterinary professionals are at risk. Coral Doherty, RVT and certified psychological health and safety advisor, submitted the winning idea to the spring Veterinary Visionaries solving event.

Coral suggested developing a set of standards for psychological safety in the veterinary workplace, a concept that grew from her knowledge of the Canadian Standard for Psychological Health and Safety. Coral discusses why psychological safety is an essential element in any healthy workplace and how these standards could transform the way we think about protecting our teams.

Find out more about Veterinary Visionaries at veterinaryvisionaries.org.

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Guest: Julie Legred, CVT, FFCVP, Deborah Reeder, BA, AS, LVT, VTS-EVN(R), and Shannon Thompson, RVT

Episode Description:

It’s Vet Tech Week, and we couldn’t think of a better way to celebrate than by featuring this conversation with three passionate technician leaders and advocates. Julie Legred, CVT, FFCVP, Deborah Reeder, BA, AS, LVT, VTS-EVN(R), and Shannon Thompson, RVT, got together with us at the AVMA Convention this summer to discuss ways we can support and elevate veterinary technicians - and help them enjoy a sustainable, fulfilling, and endlessly adaptable career.

This episode doesn’t have video, but most do! Wish you could watch these conversations? Catch Central Line on YouTube.

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Find all of AAHA’s most up-to-date Guidelines, including resources for your clients and team, at aaha.org/guidelines.

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Guest: Garrott Van Bebber, DVM, Elizabeth Van Bebber, DVM, Holly Hunt, and Kortney Ellerbe.

Episode Description:

Out of the literal thousands of AAHA-accredited practices in the U.S. and Canada (and now Japan!), the dedicated team at Lafayette Veterinary Care Center in Lafayette, LA, walked away with the AAHA-accredited Practice of the Year award at Connexity 2022. Garrott Van Bebber, DVM, co-owner of LVCC, his wife Liz Van Bebber, DVM, Holly Hunt, veterinary technician, and Kortney Ellerbe, technician and nursing department co-manager, stopped by our podcast booth in Nashville. They talked about serving their community, protecting their team from burnout, and why being a “one-stop-shop" for clients doesn’t mean always being available.

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Guest: Michael J Blackwell, DVM, MPH

Episode Description:

In any conversation about access to veterinary care, Dr. Michael J. Blackwell’s name is bound to come up. Dr. Blackwell heads the Program for Pet Health Equity at the University of Tennessee, which has created AlignCare, a subsidized OneHealth initiative that helps qualified households afford care for their nonhuman family members.

As income disparity grows along with the cost of care, we can’t afford to ignore the question of how to provide care to populations many of us working in private practices never see. Dr. Blackwell explains how AlignCare works, why "best medicine” is always relative, and how each of us in this field can help just by starting to turn towards this issue instead of turning away.

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Find all of AAHA’s most up-to-date Guidelines, including resources for your clients and team, at aaha.org/guidelines.

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Guest: Phil Richmond, DVM, CAPP, CPPC, CPHSA, CCFP, Alyssa Mages, BS, CVT, Josh Vaisman, MAPPCP, CCFP, Michael Shirley

Episode Description:

Connexity 2022 is in the books, and it was a gathering of true veterinary believers – hopeful, brilliant, and authentic. The four changemakers on this episode – Alyssa Mages, BS, CVT, of Empowering Veterinary Teams; Michael Shirley, of Family Pet Health, Josh Vaisman, MAPPCP, CCFP, of Flourish Veterinary Consulting, and Phil Richmond, DVM, CAPP, CPPC, CPHSA, CCFP, of Flourishing Phoenix Veterinary Consultants - are making waves, big and little, in the veterinary world by sharing what they’ve learned about what it really means to “be positive” and take a team approach to wellbeing. In a time when attracting and retaining veterinary professionals is at the top of everyone’s wish list, these four guide us past the pizza party into the changes in thinking that will help keep our teams together.

Find all of AAHA’s most up-to-date Guidelines, including resources for your clients and team, at aaha.org/guidelines.

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Guest: Pam Nichols, DVM, CCRP, CFI

Episode Description:

Whether we’re aware of it or not, we tell ourselves stories all day about what we see, think, and experience. Pam Nichols, DVM, CCRP, CFI, practice owner and past president of AAHA, sits down to discuss how being intentional and specific in how we speak about ourselves and those around us can have an enormous impact on how we perceive our situation. You won’t find anyone with more love for veterinary medicine or the people in it than Dr. Pam, and you’ll want to check out the resources she’s creating to help us change the narrative and see the beauty waiting for us behind each exam room door.

Email Dr. Pam at [email protected] for more information on her affirmation cards or upcoming book.

Find all of AAHA’s most up-to-date Guidelines, including resources for your clients and team, at aaha.org/guidelines.

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Guest: Deborah Thomson, DVM

Episode Description:

What does working on Capitol Hill have in common with a puppy vaccine appointment? Deborah Thomson, DVM, Chair of the World Veterinary Association’s One Health Education Subgroup, founder of One Health Lessons, and author of The Art of Science Communication, shares what she’s learned through her work as a teacher, clinical veterinarian, and Science Policy Advisor about having productive conversations about science - with ALL kinds of people.

Find all of AAHA’s most up-to-date Guidelines, including resources for your clients and team, at aaha.org/guidelines.

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Guest: John Ellis, DVM, PhD, DACVP, DACVM

Episode Description:

What does Kelly Clarkson have to do with vaccine reactions? And if people still don’t understand herd immunity after 2 ½ years of COVID, why spend time talking about it?

In honor of the release of the 2022 AAHA Canine Vaccination Guidelines, John Ellis, DVM, PhD, DACVP, DACVM, co-chair of the guidelines task force, talks with us about how to address some of the most common client objections to vaccines. You might not change a client's mind in one visit, but Dr. Ellis reminds us that each conversation we have about these can literally be the difference between life and death for the dogs we help care for.

Find the brand new 2022 AAHA Canine Vaccination Guidelines and resources at aaha.org/canine-vaccinations, and access all of AAHA’s most up-to-date Guidelines, including resources for your clients and team, at aaha.org/guidelines.

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Guest: Helen Beaman, MSW, LCSW

Episode Description:

Helen Beaman, MSW, LCSW, buys clothes for her Dachshunds and tailors them to fit – which should tell you a lot about why Helen, our guest this week, felt compelled to work with Dr. Charles Hurty and his team at Grove Veterinary Clinic when they reached out for help. Helen uses cognitive behavioral therapy, or CBT, to give her clients tools to cope with difficult situations and overwhelming emotions like the ones veterinary professionals grapple with every day, and in this episode she discusses why she thinks CBT and veterinary teams are such a good fit. Stick around and you’ll get to try one of the exercises she taught the Grove team.

For the background on Dr. Hurty and Grove’s GRIT + LOVE initiative, check out last week’s episode - and read our NEWStat story about them here.

Find out more about cognitive behavioral therapy (CBT) here.

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Find all of AAHA’s most up-to-date Guidelines, including resources for your clients and team, at aaha.org/guidelines.

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Guest:
Charles Hurty, DVM

Alana McKern
Operations manager at Grove Veterinary Clinic in Newport, Oregon

Episode Description:

Earlier this year, an email popped up in our podcast inbox from Dr. Charles Hurty, owner of Grove Veterinary Clinic in Newport, OR, who had been doing some incredible work with his team to help them all get through the difficult realities of veterinary life over the last two years. Dr. Hurty and Alana McKern, Grove’s operations manager and bada** unicorn, join us to talk about retraining your brain, leading from the floor, and why, in Dr. Hurty’s words, “empathy without boundaries is truly self-destructive.”

Read our NEWStat story about Groves GRIT + LOVE initiative here.

Find out more about cognitive behavioral therapy (CBT) here.

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Find all of AAHA’s most up-to-date Guidelines, including resources for your clients and team, at aaha.org/guidelines.

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Guest: Steve Magness

Episode Description:

A lot of us have heard it our whole lives: “You have to be tough to get through vet/tech school.” “I don’t know how you handle seeing sick pets/get by on so little sleep/make hard decisions all day – you must be so tough.” And yet... how many times have you finished a shift, maybe even sat in your car in your driveway after work, feeling anything but tough?

This week, Steve Magness, athlete, performance coach, and author of the new book Do Hard Things: Why We Get Resilience Wrong and the Surprising Science of Real Toughness, takes his years of coaching experience and resilience research and applies it (for the very first time!) to veterinary medicine. Steve talks about why a sense of control makes us more resilient, why you can’t fake your way through the big stuff, and why having our basic psychological needs met is an essential ingredient for toughness.

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Learn more about Steve’s books and podcasts, sign up for his newsletter, and get in touch at www.stevemagness.com.

Find all of AAHA’s most up-to-date Guidelines, including resources for your clients and team, at aaha.org/guidelines.

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Guest: Dr. Cherice Roth

Episode Description:

Cherice Roth, DVM, MS, is the kind of person you just don’t want to stop talking to. So we asked her back for a second episode (check out her first one here!), this time to talk about how telehealth can increase access to veterinary care – not just for people who want high-touch service, but for people who can’t afford to take off work to bring a pet in, who may not know when their pets need to be seen, or who might not realize that veterinarians can have a lot more in common with them than a love of animals.

It’s impossible not to feel optimistic about the future of our profession by the end of this conversation!

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Learn more about Dr. Roth or get in touch on social

• LinkedIn @chericeroth
• Facebook @RothDVM
• Instagram @cherice.roth
• Twitter @chericeroth

Get autographed copies of Dr. Roth’s books, as well as other goodies for kids and adults, at The Real Doctor Store. You can also find her books at Amazon and other retailers.

Pay a visit to PrideVMC and the Multicultural Veterinary Medical Association (MCVMA) - thanks to these amazing groups for all they do to benefit our profession and our people!

Find all of AAHA’s most up-to-date Guidelines, including resources for your clients and team, at aaha.org/guidelines.

Send us feedback or questions anytime at [email protected].

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Guest: Ross Palmer, DVM, MS, DACVS

Episode Description:

Are we letting our new grads down? Ross Palmer, DVM, MS, DACVS, returns to Central Line to discuss an area he’s particularly passionate about: continuing education. From his position as Associate Director of Education at CSU’s Translational Medicine Institute, he thinks a lot about CE and the gaps he sees in what he calls “the continuum of postgraduate lifelong learning.” Dr. Palmer introduces ideas from commercial pilot training programs, including their approach to hands-on skills and risk mitigation, that may change the way we think - not only about CE, but about ourselves.

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Find out more about veterinary CE at Colorado State here.

Find all of AAHA’s most up-to-date Guidelines, including resources for your clients and team, at aaha.org/guidelines.

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Guest: Cyndie Courtney, DVM

Episode Description:

In July of 2021, Cyndie Courtney, DVM, wrote an article for AAHA’s Trends^® magazine called “Client Expectations, Rights, and Responsibilities : Setting Client Expectations to Protect Practice Culture.” The article made waves because it faced head-on the question of whether we, as veterinary professionals, might be able to set boundaries for how we want our teams to be treated - while helping our clients have reasonable expectations for how we will treat them. In this episode, Dr. Courtney tackles some difficult topics and offers tips to help improve trust and transparency with clients.

Catch up with Dr. Courtney on her website, TheJerkResearcher.com, on Facebook, or on LinkedIn.

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Find all of AAHA’s most up-to-date Guidelines, including resources for your clients and team, at aaha.org/guidelines.

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Guest: Tierra Price, DVM, MPH

Episode Description:

Tierra Price, DVM, MPH, founder of BlackDVM Network, was changing veterinary medicine before she even graduated (which she did at the height of the COVID-19 pandemic). In her bio, she says she wants to show up as her entire self and “inspire others to boldly take on challenges in veterinary medicine,” and in this episode she does just that. Having already accumulated a wealth of experiences in her first two years of practice, Dr. Price offers thoughts on how we can improve awareness and options for families who face significant barriers to seeking veterinary care for their pets.

Find all of AAHA’s most up-to-date Guidelines, including resources for your clients and team, at aaha.org/guidelines.

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Guest: Joanne Intile DVM, MS, DACVIM (oncology), Certified Veterinary Journalist

Episode Description:

A special report in the March 15, 2022 issue of the Journal of the American Veterinary Medical Association (JAVMA) shed light on whether the written instructions and summaries we send home with pet owners are actually readable for most of them. Joanne Intile, DVM, MS, Dip-Oncology, was one of the authors on this study and sat down to talk about why “don’t worry, I’ll write it all down for you,” might not always help as much as we might think. Dr. Intile talks about how these findings may affect how we train our teams, the care we provide for our patients, and the way vet students learn.

Connect with Dr. Intile on Facebook | @DrJoanneIntile

Looking for an app that helps determine readability of written materials? Try Hemingway or Grammarly.

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Learn more about Connexity^® 2022 as registration is now open.

Find all of AAHA’s most up-to-date Guidelines, including resources for your clients and team, at aaha.org/guidelines.

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Guest: Senani Ratnayake BSc RVT

Episode Description:

As veterinary professionals, we work where days (and nights) can get long, where stakes and emotions run high, and where demands on our time and energy can sometimes seem unreasonable. But nearly all of us have a “why” - a reason for starting down this sometimes complicated, always challenging road and that keeps us coming back. Senani Ratnayake BSc RVT uses her “why” to help veterinary teams work together better – by rediscovering, sharing, and digging into their own.

Listening to Senani speak reminds us that while our work can seem to require tough skin, our vulnerability can be our strength.

Reach Senani at Motivatum Consulting, and Canadians can join Vet Alliance and work with her and other talented professionals there.

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Learn more about Connexity^® 2022 as registration is now open.

Find all of AAHA’s most up-to-date Guidelines, including resources for your clients and team, at aaha.org/guidelines.

Send us feedback or questions anytime at [email protected].

Listen where your favorite podcasts are found:

Guest: Dr. Cherice Roth

Episode Description:

If anyone can convince kids (and adults!) that anything is possible, it’s Cherice Roth, DVM, MS. Besides being a mom of two, Chief Veterinary Officer at Fuzzy Pet Health, volunteer and Special Projects Chair at the Multicultural Veterinary Medical Association, and practicing veterinarian, Dr. Roth is also the author of two children’s books, with more to follow. Her books show kids of all backgrounds that “real doctors” can do almost anything – and look like anyone, including just like them. Don’t miss this uplifting conversation with one of the most optimistic, dynamic, and multitalented people in vet med today.

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Learn more about Dr. Roth or get in touch on social

• LinkedIn @chericeroth
• Facebook @RothDVM
• Instagram @cherice.roth
• Twitter @chericeroth

Get autographed copies of Dr. Roth’s books, as well as other goodies for kids and adults, at The Real Doctor Store. You can also find her books at Amazon and other retailers.

Pay a visit to PrideVMC and the Multicultural Veterinary Medical Association (MCVMA) - thanks to these amazing groups for all they do to benefit our profession and our people!

Find all of AAHA’s most up-to-date Guidelines, including resources for your clients and team, at aaha.org/guidelines.

Send us feedback or questions anytime at [email protected].

Listen where your favorite podcasts are found:

Guest: Deborah Thomson, DVM

Episode Description:

What does working on Capitol Hill have in common with a puppy vaccine appointment? Deborah Thomson, DVM, Chair of the World Veterinary Association’s One Health Education Subgroup, founder of One Health Lessons, and author of The Art of Science Communication, shares what she’s learned through her work as a teacher, clinical veterinarian, and Science Policy Advisor about having productive conversations about science - with ALL kinds of people.

Find all of AAHA’s most up-to-date Guidelines, including resources for your clients and team, at aaha.org/guidelines.

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Guest: Patty Casebolt

Episode Description:

For lots of us in veterinary medicine, the alleged benefits of a mindfulness and meditation practice haven’t been enough for us to stick with it – or even, in many cases, to give it a try. Patty Casebolt, Chief Operating Officer at Medical Eye Center and certified Mindfulness/Mediation facilitator, comes to us from the human side of healthcare and offers a real-life take on how busy professionals can work “mindful moments” into their days. Studies show that even a few minutes daily can actually retrain your brain – no cushion or chanting required. At the close of this episode, Patty leads us in a mindful moment of our own, and from one skeptic to another, trust me – you’ll feel better afterwards.

Note: For a small percentage of people who have a mental health diagnosis or have experienced trauma, mindfulness and meditation can provoke anxiety or other negative emotions. If you fall into one of these categories, you may want to check with your health care provider beforehand.

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Guest: Ross Palmer, DVM, DACVS

Episode Description:

Ross Palmer, DVM, DACVS, knows a thing or two about orthopedic surgery (and a lot of other stuff). But even he found himself in a room one day with a very overweight Lab, talking at a client instead of talking to him. Hear what Dr. Palmer learned from Griz and his owner that day about communication, expectations, and what we can achieve together if we avoid assumptions and take the time to listen.

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Find out more about veterinary CE at Colorado State here.

Find all of AAHA’s most up-to-date Guidelines, including resources for your clients and team, at aaha.org/guidelines.

Send us feedback or questions anytime at [email protected].

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Guest: Stacee Santi, DVM

Episode Description:

Stacee Santi, DVM, CEO and founder of Vet2Pet, didn’t set out to revolutionize the way veterinary practices communicated – she just wanted to send her clients a notification to help them remember to give their monthly prevention. In this week’s episode, Dr. Stacee explains how the right technology can help bond clients to our practices (you won’t believe how many clients, on average, will leave the exam room today and never come back!) and free up time and energy for our teams – and she gives some great tips on how anyone in the practice can make a few minutes of real-time contact really count.

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Hear more from Dr. Stacee on the podcast she co-hosts with our guest from episode #2, Dr. Caitlin DeWilde, #IVETSOHARD, connect with her on LinkedIn, and check out her company, Vet2Pet.

Find all of AAHA’s most up-to-date Guidelines, including resources for your clients and team, at aaha.org/guidelines.

Send us feedback or questions anytime at [email protected].

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Guest: Cynthia Otto, DVM, PhD

Episode Description:

One of the most beautiful things about veterinary medicine is our front row seat to all the different ways the human-animal bond shows up. Cynthia Otto, DVM, PhD, sees some pretty amazing examples of that bond in her work at the Penn Vet Working Dog Center. Dr. Otto, chair of the task force for AAHA’s 2021 Working, Assistance, and Therapy Dog Guidelines, shares her wealth of experience with us – including some valuable lessons any vet team can learn from the challenges of working with working dogs.

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Learn about the Penn Vet Working Dog Practitioner Certification

Make a donation: Penn Vet Working Dog Center, Search Dog Foundation, Assistance Dogs International

Check out the 2021 AAHA Working, Assistance, and Therapy Dog Guidelines - these Guidelines are worth a read even if you don’t routinely see working dogs! - and check out all of AAHA’s most up-to-date Guidelines, including resources for your clients and team, at aaha.org/guidelines.

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Guest: David Ballard, PsyD, MBA, MA

Episode Description:

When an entire profession is struggling, it’s a problem that will take more than self-care to solve. David Ballard, PsyD, MBA, the former head of the American Psychological Association’s Office of Applied Psychology, has spent much of his career focusing on how to create psychologically healthy workplaces in professions facing many of the same challenges we do in veterinary medicine.

Dr. Ballard has ventured into vet med by way of Veterinary Visionaries, where nearly 50 organizations are collaborating right now to find ways to improve wellbeing and mental health in the profession as a whole. This episode will leave you believing that you could be a changemaker, no matter your role in your workplace.

Find out more about Veterinary Visionaries, including how to log into the solving platform to share and vote on ideas, https://veterinaryvisionaries.org/. The top four ideas split a $5000 cash prize! Be sure to log in before the platform closes on May 27, 2022.

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Find all of AAHA’s most up-to-date Guidelines, including resources for your clients and team, at aaha.org/guidelines.

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Guest: Debbie Boone, CVPM

Episode Description:

Just talking to Debbie Boone, CVPM, makes you feel calmer – it’s easy to see how she built her career out of helping people communicate better. But she maintains that anyone can learn skills like active listening and de-escalation, and she gives some terrific tips for implementing these skills in practice. While we intended this conversation to speak directly to our colleagues in client service, Debbie’s advice will ring true for anyone who deals with people on a regular basis (so... that’s all of us).

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Find Debbie on Facebook and at 2 Manage Vets Consulting, and check out one of our favorite books, Crucial Conversations, which Debbie says should be required reading for the entire planet.

Find all of AAHA’s most up-to-date Guidelines, including resources for your clients and team, at aaha.org/guidelines.

Send us feedback or questions anytime at [email protected].

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Guest: Eric Garcia

Episode Description:

Companies with strong branding don’t take breaks from advertising just because their popular products are out of stock – and, according to our guest, Eric Garcia, veterinary practices shouldn’t take breaks from marketing themselves just because there’s no extra room in the schedule right now.

Eric is a digital marketing expert and sought-after voice on the veterinary speaking circuit, and he recommends that practices take a data-driven approach to marketing themselves.

This conversation isn’t just for practice owners and managers – Eric outlines some simple things anyone in the practice can do to improve the day-to-day client experience (because that’s marketing, too!) when the schedule is packed.

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Get in touch with Eric on Facebook, Instagram, or LinkedIn, by email at [email protected], or on his website.

Find all of AAHA’s most up-to-date Guidelines, including resources for your clients and team, at aaha.org/guidelines.

Send us feedback or questions anytime at [email protected].

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Guest: Garth Jordan

Episode Description:

Veterinary medicine is a field full of problem solvers – we are all experts at working together to troubleshoot tough cases and doing our best with what we’ve got. Garth Jordan, CEO of AAHA, believes that solving the big issues that affect all of us will take teamwork on a much larger scale. Garth joins us to talk about Veterinary Visionaries, a project designed to allow us to help each other solve the most persistent problems facing the veterinary profession today.

Find out more about Veterinary Visionaries here.

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Find all of AAHA’s most up-to-date Guidelines, including resources for your clients and team, at aaha.org/guidelines.

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Guest: Tasha McNerney, BS, CVT, CVPP, VTS (Anesthesia and Analgesia)

Episode Description:

We’ve got pain on the brain around here, thanks to the release of the 2022 AAHA Pain Management Guidelines for Dogs and Cats – good thing Tasha McNerney, CVT, CVPP, VTS (Anesthesia/Analgesia), never gets tired of talking about pain. Tasha joins us to share her insight on involving the whole team in the management of pain, what she’s learned in her time teaching vet teams, and why, when our credentialed technicians are thriving, our practices and the rest of our teams are more likely to thrive too.

Find Tasha on Facebook and at Veterinary Anesthesia Nerds.  

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Find all of AAHA’s most up-to-date Guidelines, including resources for your clients and team, at aaha.org/guidelines.

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Guest: Caitlin DeWilde, DVM

Episode Description:

We’ve all had a perfectly good day ruined by a bad online review. It can be tempting to shun social media entirely to avoid the negativity, but then we lose what can be a big-time builder of client loyalty and trust. Caitlin DeWilde, DVM, of The Social DVM, gives us great advice for improving how we receive and respond to reviews – both good and bad! - and for reshaping our social media protocols. (It’s OK if you don’t have those. Start here!) 

Get in touch with Caitlin at The Social DVM and check out the podcast she co-hosts at #IVETSOHARD.  

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Guest: Alison Gottlieb, CVT, VTS (ECC)

Episode Description:

Alison Gottlieb, CVT, VTS (ECC), joins us this week to help us celebrate the release of the 2022 AAHA Pain Management Guidelines. Ali served as a member of the task force behind these Guidelines, and she’s passionate about pain (and all things feline). Her main takeaways when it comes to managing pain in pets: We need to be proactive, and we need to work together.

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Find all of AAHA’s Guidelines, including resources for your clients and team, at aaha.org/guidelines.

Send us feedback or questions anytime at [email protected].

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