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Keeping large-animal vets on the farm
Cow
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Steve Chiotakis: When a farmer in this country needs help caring for a sick cow, the nearest veterinarian could be several hours away. Large-animal vets are becoming an endangered species as more vet school grads choose the relatively lucrative option of treating dogs and cats. Now, some states are trying to lure more young vets back to the farm. Joel Rose reports.
Lester Griel: How many babies does a pig have at a time? Huh?
Joel Rose: In a classroom at Penn State University, a dozen high-school students get a lesson in animal reproduction from professor Lester Griel.
Griel: How many babies does a cow have at a time?
Student: One.
Griel: One I hope. I hate twins.
The students are spending a Saturday at a conference on veterinary medicine. Professor Robert Van Saun says most of these students are familiar only with dogs and cats.
Robert Van Saun: The greatest chance we have to get people think about large-animal practice is to start early.
And the stakes are high. There are roughly 500 rural counties in the U.S. that have lots of pigs, cows and horses, and no veterinarians to treat them. Most vet school grads choose to work with pets. They're drawn by the shorter hours, better working conditions and starting salaries up to 20 percent higher.
David Wolfgang: We're stretched thin, we haven't broken yet. But what happened is if we had a major outbreak, a major food safety issue, that's when crisis gets more critical.
David Wolfgang is the chairman of Project Pennsylvania. It's a campaign to recruit more large-animal veterinarians into the profession -- and keep them there.
Wolfgang: Professional school education is extraordinarily expensive. Many students graduate from professional school with between $110,000 to $160,000 of debt. So it's really challenging for young professionals.
Thirteen states offer some kind debt relief for students who agree to specialize in treating cows, horses and other farm animals. And some aspiring veterinarians say they're willing to trade higher wages for a more rewarding practice.
Penn State senior Maggie Zink says she wants to work with large animals:
Maggie Zink: I just loved the experience of it. Not being in an office all day long, seeing clients in and out of the door. You get to go out and be out in the country.
Zink's teachers have to hope she still feels that way when she graduates from veterinary school.
In State College, Penn., I'm Joel Rose for Marketplace.
As a practicing dairy veterinarian for the last 15 years, I agree with the commenter that said since there is more of an economic factor applied to farm animals generally, the limit to diagnostic and therapeutic capabilities for farm animals is real. On the other hand, farm veterinarians still get to use their senses (sight, sound, smell, touch) to help with diagnosis, rather than becoming ever more reliant on laboratory findings like in small animal and equine medicine/surgery. I think farm animal medicine (at least dairy) is more of a life style decision as well as having a factor of knowing that you are contributing to the food production sector. This can be very gratifying. One either quickly accepts the realities of farm life (and its economic emphasis) or doesn't. The weather is also a factor, when the weather is pleasant it's nearly a joy sitting in a meadow giving a cow an IV for milk fever but having to put a prolapsed uterus back into a cow when it is 34 degrees and raining is not a joy at all. However, in sum, even poor weather isn't too terrible to work with. Besides, most farm production animals are kept indoors these days (unfortunately), so being out in bad weather is more the drive to get there for many vets. In closing I'll say that the feeling of success is wonderful when the farmer calls and the animal is in a very bad way, and by the time you're finished working on her she is up and happily eating again. Nothing better than that! But I think that even the best intentioned students need to remember that the farmer wishes that such emergencies wouldn't ever occur in the first place. However, farmers are very realistic and also very appreciative for a good veterinarian who is willing to roll up their sleeves and do the tough work needed to help a patient get well again.
Whether one area of veterinary practice is harder than another is subjective to your interests, experience, etc. I am a recent veterinary school graduate. My passion is to work with cattle and agriculture. The main problem preventing me from doing so is exactly what Dr. Wolfgang said in the interview...DEBT. I had even more than the high end of debt that he mentioned. We cannot expect farmers, especially dairy farmers who are being paid very poorly and have many other expenses, to pay back our college debt. In order to make it we have to at least do mixed practice. In my case, there are no longer enough farm animals to support a veterinarian doing strictly large animal work in my area. I would have to move away from my own cattle and home to do both the work I enjoy and make enough money to pay these huge monthly loan payments that burden me.
There is an article on wikihorseworld.com that I have found to be very informative on the subject of large animal veterinarians. The link to that article is: http://www.wikihorseworld.com/wiki/Large_Animal_Veterinarians
My husband has been a rural large animal veterinarian for 26 years and it’s hard for him to encourage anyone to follow in his footsteps. With long hours, low pay, dangerous duties and an increasing lack of support from the community, it’s hard to find the motivation. For example, today, an established client called with many questions about equine vaccines and then proceeded to inform him that she would be ordering the vaccines through a mail order catalog!
Sir, there are a number of reasons recent vet school graduates prefer small animal/pet practice in addition to the money. When I say pet practice I include horses. Horses actually fall into two categories. 1)Race horses. There is potentially big money there. Pleasure horses. These are really nothing more than pets. Again, potentially more money.
Cattle, goats, sheep, etc. Not only is the money less but the opportunity to practice medicine is less. For example, if a goat is worth about $100, no one is going to sink $500 into treating it.Yet, it's very easy to run up $500 in veterinary fees. To stay below $100, the veterinarian is very limited in what he can do.We learn sophisticated procedures in vet school but,financial constraints prohibit us from using them when treating livestock. I want the opportunity to diagnose and treat disease. Small animal practice presents more of such opportunities. On the down side, lawsuits are definitely increasing in small animal practice. No one is going to sue if the veterinarian misdiagnoses a $100 goat.
Here is another consideration. Weather. Yes, Large animal practice is great in summer, but who wants to help birth lambs on cold dark February nights?
Your story failed to address the poultry veterinarian.
