Thinking about applying to vet school - looking for honest advice

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cpcaeduson

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Hey guys, newbie here! I've been thinking of applying of for vet school and have some questions for you all. I'm currently attending a 4 year college - going into junior next spring and I'm done with their 1st year nursing program. I chose nursing because my family has a big background in it and if I chose to specialize in something else I think I'll get shunned for it. However nursing is really burning me out. Playing patient detective is nice but it's just so repetitive and procedural that my mind gets numb. I just don't enjoy it anymore and the thought of doing this for the rest of my life absolutely kills my spirit. I also work part-time as a vet-assistant and every time I leave for work my mood flips a 180 and I feel absolutely ecstatic about my job. I'm about to pull the trigger and switch my major to biology with the hopes of completing vet school pre-reqs and then apply.

I've hinted my switch with my family a couple times and they've said that vets don't make as much as nurses and will be struggling financially. Is that true? I also plan on discussing this with my college counselor next week too. What do you guys think about this?

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Hey guys, newbie here! I've been thinking of applying of for vet school and have some questions for you all. I'm currently attending a 4 year college - going into junior next spring and I'm done with their 1st year nursing program. I chose nursing because my family has a big background in it and if I chose to specialize in something else I think I'll get shunned for it. However nursing is really burning me out. Playing patient detective is nice but it's just so repetitive and procedural that my mind gets numb. I just don't enjoy it anymore and the thought of doing this for the rest of my life absolutely kills my spirit. I also work part-time as a vet-assistant and every time I leave for work my mood flips a 180 and I feel absolutely ecstatic about my job. I'm about to pull the trigger and switch my major to biology with the hopes of completing vet school pre-reqs and then apply.

I've hinted my switch with my family a couple times and they've said that vets don't make as much as nurses and will be struggling financially. Is that true? I also plan on discussing this with my college counselor next week too. What do you guys think about this?

It's not quite as simple as "vets vs. nurses" .... vet incomes have a pretty wide ranges, as do nurses (depending on specialization and advanced training). In very general terms, a vet is going to make somewhat more than a nurse - but it's not always true. Some nurses will make more than vets, and some vets will make much more than nurses. But, the nurse has to do 4 years of school (give or take, depending on the state and the degree) whereas a vet has to do 8 years (give or take). The debt for the vet is typically going to be higher.

From a money standpoint ... nurses can do pretty darn good nowadays. High demand = higher pay.

On the flip side - I don't think it's wise to let your family drive your decision. Their feedback is important, sure, but you shouldn't make your choices based on what will please/satisfy them. That's a recipe for resentment and regret.
 
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Hey guys, newbie here! I've been thinking of applying of for vet school and have some questions for you all. I'm currently attending a 4 year college - going into junior next spring and I'm done with their 1st year nursing program. I chose nursing because my family has a big background in it and if I chose to specialize in something else I think I'll get shunned for it. However nursing is really burning me out. Playing patient detective is nice but it's just so repetitive and procedural that my mind gets numb. I just don't enjoy it anymore and the thought of doing this for the rest of my life absolutely kills my spirit. I also work part-time as a vet-assistant and every time I leave for work my mood flips a 180 and I feel absolutely ecstatic about my job. I'm about to pull the trigger and switch my major to biology with the hopes of completing vet school pre-reqs and then apply.

I've hinted my switch with my family a couple times and they've said that vets don't make as much as nurses and will be struggling financially. Is that true? I also plan on discussing this with my college counselor next week too. What do you guys think about this?


A lot will depend on where you live and what you're doing with the degree, but I think in terms of national averages, vets earn a little more than registered nurses. However, usually nursing requires less education and therefore less cost, so the cost of education:average starting salary ratio is better.

I also agree with LIS that you don't want your family making steering your decisions about higher education and career choices - that's a recipe for disaster (or at least a recipe for some simmering resentment).
 
Hi!
I am just going to throw my 2 cents in here. I think it is awesome that you are thinking of getting out of nursing since you really don't like it and it's not what you want your whole life to be about. However, I also think that taking the leap into vetmed could also end in the same result for you. I would really get to know the profession before deciding that you want to be a vet. I think it is really good that you are working at a vet clinic so you can see head-on what it is like on a day to day basis. You said that you don't like the repetition and boring aspects of being a nurse; but honestly, vetmed can be really similar to that. You do a lot of the same stuff day in and day out, and it sounds like this might really burn you out as well. Take a step back and look at life through the vet's eyes. Ask yourself, "is this really something I can do every day?". A vet tech or vet assistant's job is going to be very different than the vet them self, so be sure you won't mind life being somewhat repetitive! If you are okay with this, I say do it! Don't get stuck doing something you hate!
Also, if it's about money, I don't think you will be happy as a vet. You have to love the job with the understanding that you most likely won't be rich.
Much luck!
 
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You said that you don't like the repetition and boring aspects of being a nurse; but honestly, vetmed can be really similar to that. You do a lot of the same stuff day in and day out, and it sounds like this might really burn you out as well. Take a step back and look at life through the vet's eyes. Ask yourself, "is this really something I can do every day?". A vet tech or vet assistant's job is going to be very different than the vet them self, so be sure you won't mind life being somewhat repetitive!

I meant to post something similar when I first saw this post a few days ago, but I didn't have a chance and now you beat me to it :) My days are EXTREMELY repetitive... and I would say that my friends who are in nursing are the ones who are closest to understanding the day-to-day reality of my job. My entire day is a blur of giving vaccines, drawing blood, reading fecals, educating owners on hw prevention, etc. A good 50-75% of my day is spent engaged in non-doctor tasks, and even the doctor tasks (surgeries, interpreting diagnostics, physical exams) become repetitive/boring over time.

I think a lot of pre-vet students end up gaining experience at an old-school clinic, where there's a friendly old doc and an entire support staff to help him (because these practices are usually more likely to take on volunteers). Doc is usually happy with his career choice due to a totally different financial situation, he's working at a slower pace because his loans are paid off and there's no one breathing down his throat about 'the numbers,' and it is a very unique environment. Those practices are becoming less and less common, though, so what I'd really suggest for someone who wants a better view of vet med is to work in a large multi-doctor practice or work in a corporate practice like Banfield. Those work environments are VERY different from 'good old doc' but are much more likely to be the type of environment that you'll be working in after veterinary school.
 
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I think a lot of pre-vet students end up gaining experience at an old-school clinic, where there's a friendly old doc and an entire support staff to help him (because these practices are usually more likely to take on volunteers). Doc is usually happy with his career choice due to a totally different financial situation, he's working at a slower pace because his loans are paid off and there's no one breathing down his throat about 'the numbers,' and it is a very unique environment. Those practices are becoming less and less common, though, so what I'd really suggest for someone who wants a better view of vet med is to work in a large multi-doctor practice or work in a corporate practice like Banfield. Those work environments are VERY different from 'good old doc' but are much more likely to be the type of environment that you'll be working in after veterinary school.
This is a really good point, and not one I have seen emphasized here before.
Most people I know volunteered with Vets who are older and have a very different financial situation and lifestyle.

It can be hard to understand the difference when you are first starting out.
 
This is a really good point, and not one I have seen emphasized here before.
Most people I know volunteered with Vets who are older and have a very different financial situation and lifestyle.

It can be hard to understand the difference when you are first starting out.

I think a lot of corporate practices have policies preventing pre-vets from hanging there much. I don't know whether it's 25% of them, 50%, or 75% (you know what I mean), but.... the three I'm most familiar with all don't allow it except for veterinary students on externship. So it's probably easier to get experience at the type of clinic that isn't necessarily representative of what life will be like after graduation. Kinda sucks.

What is Banfield's pre-vet policy? If they allow them, or leave it to the discretion of the doctor, that wouldn't honestly be a bad place for a pre-vet. So many of my classmates ended up working at a Banfield.....

Does VCA have a policy, or is it clinic-by-clinic? (I'd suspect the latter, since they reportedly are more hands-off at the individual clinic level.)

There are plenty of exceptions. People just need to hunt for them and be bold about asking for a chance to observe.

I'm certainly willing to take on shadows/etc, but pre-vets don't usually want to hang in an ER. And it can be kinda weird - tends to feel like feast or famine where there's absolutely nothing going on except tv-watching, or you've got 6 hospitalized cases, 1 that you need to roll into surgery, 3 in exam rooms, and a few waiting in the lobby that were triaged as 'stable but need to be seen'. In which case, a shadower who isn't smart about staying out of the way could be a real annoyance. So we don't get many. We do get a fair number of 4th years on externship, though.
 
What is Banfield's pre-vet policy? If they allow them, or leave it to the discretion of the doctor, that wouldn't honestly be a bad place for a pre-vet. So many of my classmates ended up working at a Banfield.....
They would let a pre-vet work there as a veterinary assistant. They are less likely to let you shadow without setting it up as a student job program.
 
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High turnover means it's often not too hard to find a job at Banfield, but shadowing is typically for vet students only.
 
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unless it is a charter hospital (they are privately owned franchises), that's a corporate decision. Charters will sometimes let pre-vets shadow (depends on the owner) but they aren't really the best representative of corporate medicine.
 
I worked for a corporate practice and I've seen maybe one or two pre-vets and high school students shadow on a few occasions. However, they would only come in for a few hours in the morning and it was always a one-day kind of thing just to see what our hospital was like, never anything extensive. Students who wanted more long-term experience to rack up hours for vet school applications usually end up being employed part time.

It was funny though, because the shadows always ended up following me around and asking me questions (the person who had the most fun with the animals) and not observing the actual veterinarians, who were usually in exam rooms or in surgery.
 
I'm at a VCA now and I don't know if it's a company-wide policy but we do have a shadow regularly. He isn't allowed to do anything but observe. No touching a patient at all. We have a couple high school or early college aged people who are hired as technician assistants. They get more hands on experience I suppose but even then they are mostly limited to cleaning cages and restraining for the techs rather than directly helping the doctors much for the first year or so it seems.
 
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Hey guys, newbie here! I've been thinking of applying of for vet school and have some questions for you all. I'm currently attending a 4 year college - going into junior next spring and I'm done with their 1st year nursing program. I chose nursing because my family has a big background in it and if I chose to specialize in something else I think I'll get shunned for it. However nursing is really burning me out. Playing patient detective is nice but it's just so repetitive and procedural that my mind gets numb. I just don't enjoy it anymore and the thought of doing this for the rest of my life absolutely kills my spirit. I also work part-time as a vet-assistant and every time I leave for work my mood flips a 180 and I feel absolutely ecstatic about my job. I'm about to pull the trigger and switch my major to biology with the hopes of completing vet school pre-reqs and then apply.

I've hinted my switch with my family a couple times and they've said that vets don't make as much as nurses and will be struggling financially. Is that true? I also plan on discussing this with my college counselor next week too. What do you guys think about this?
I just want to throw this out there. I was a nursing student at Duke University, awesome nursing school. I was so miserable, and although I never wanted to be a nurse, I felt as if I had to. My dad was paying my tuition, and he insisted on nursing. I finally grew a pair and told him how unhappy and depressed I was. Surprisingly, he was okay with a major change. I was so shocked, because he is one of those dads. Your family should want you to be happy, no matter the cost/salary.
 
Your family should want you to be happy, no matter the cost/salary.

Yes, but financial security is one of the best things that you can do for your happiness. Not saying that you should go into a job that you hate, but you at least need to consider that side of things.

I swore up and down that I'd never get married or have kids and career would always come first.... but here I am, 37 years old, married to a man that I love with a toddler at home and plans to start trying for kiddo #2. Life has a way of throwing surprises at you, and it's a lot easier to enjoy those things if you have the financial resources to do so.
 
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As far as nurses making more than vets a lot of that depends on where you live and where you are practicing. If you are going to be practicing in a rural area you probably will be making as much as a nurse, but in more urban area's you will be making more. For example in South Florida vets make a lot more than nurses do, especially new nurses. My mom has been a nurse here for 25 years and says nurses starting now will never make as much as she does now. Most of the hospitals here are choosing to hire agency nurses or per diem nurses to cut costs and have stopped giving raises as they have done in the past, so most nurses starting today make only $20/hr and won't see much of an increase. In our area most vets make around what she does or more (~$80,000) which is a lot more than the average nurse because of her experience and working as a nurse manager. She has told me with the way that nursing is changing she would much rather have me be in dept becoming a vet than becoming a nurse. With that being said there are still vets that make less than nurses and nurses that make less than vets. Ultimately you should choose a profession that you love and enjoy, both careers will be able to support a modest lifestyle they won't make you rich but you should be able to live comfortably.
 
Yes, but financial security is one of the best things that you can do for your happiness. Not saying that you should go into a job that you hate, but you at least need to consider that side of things.

Agreed.

You will also discover that your job will not be your whole entire life, nor will you want it to be that way. It doesn't hurt to do a cost-benefit analysis and see things rationally.
 
Yes, but financial security is one of the best things that you can do for your happiness. Not saying that you should go into a job that you hate, but you at least need to consider that side of things.


Absolutely.

Money can buy happiness - as much as people don't like to admit it. If money isn't buying happiness, you're not spending it correctly ;)
 
As far as nurses making more than vets a lot of that depends on where you live and where you are practicing. If you are going to be practicing in a rural area you probably will be making as much as a nurse, but in more urban area's you will be making more. For example in South Florida vets make a lot more than nurses do, especially new nurses. My mom has been a nurse here for 25 years and says nurses starting now will never make as much as she does now. Most of the hospitals here are choosing to hire agency nurses or per diem nurses to cut costs and have stopped giving raises as they have done in the past, so most nurses starting today make only $20/hr and won't see much of an increase. In our area most vets make around what she does or more (~$80,000) which is a lot more than the average nurse because of her experience and working as a nurse manager. She has told me with the way that nursing is changing she would much rather have me be in dept becoming a vet than becoming a nurse. With that being said there are still vets that make less than nurses and nurses that make less than vets. Ultimately you should choose a profession that you love and enjoy, both careers will be able to support a modest lifestyle they won't make you rich but you should be able to live comfortably.
I bet the student loan debt is less for a nurse than for a vet on average
 
I don't want fancy things.... but I do want the financial freedom to take a 12-week maternity leave with my next kiddo, have the option of going below 40 hrs/wk if life ever demands it, and know that I can weather an emergency. I've also recently become enamored of the idea of early 'retirement' (not really retiring at all, but trading my current lifestyle of timeclock punching and constant production pressure for meaningful PT or volunteer work). All of these things require money.... and the majority of vets graduating in this era will be too limited by loans to ever achieve those goals.
 
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I meant to post something similar when I first saw this post a few days ago, but I didn't have a chance and now you beat me to it :) My days are EXTREMELY repetitive... and I would say that my friends who are in nursing are the ones who are closest to understanding the day-to-day reality of my job. My entire day is a blur of giving vaccines, drawing blood, reading fecals, educating owners on hw prevention, etc. A good 50-75% of my day is spent engaged in non-doctor tasks, and even the doctor tasks (surgeries, interpreting diagnostics, physical exams) become repetitive/boring over time.

I wanted to emphasize this as well. At a run-of-the-mill SA GP, there will be a lot of repetition, even with sick patients (vomiting/diarrhea work up, for example). I know each place is different, but a lot of the potentially cool cases get referred out - which I support 100%, because I want the diagnosed figured out, the patient better and the owners happy, but it doesn't really lend itself to the reality-TV-esque lifestyle. That doesn't mean vet med can't be ever-changing and exciting, but GP is usually not the place to find that level of unpredictability.
 
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Hey guys, newbie here! I've been thinking of applying of for vet school and have some questions for you all. I'm currently attending a 4 year college - going into junior next spring and I'm done with their 1st year nursing program. I chose nursing because my family has a big background in it and if I chose to specialize in something else I think I'll get shunned for it. However nursing is really burning me out. Playing patient detective is nice but it's just so repetitive and procedural that my mind gets numb. I just don't enjoy it anymore and the thought of doing this for the rest of my life absolutely kills my spirit. I also work part-time as a vet-assistant and every time I leave for work my mood flips a 180 and I feel absolutely ecstatic about my job. I'm about to pull the trigger and switch my major to biology with the hopes of completing vet school pre-reqs and then apply.

I've hinted my switch with my family a couple times and they've said that vets don't make as much as nurses and will be struggling financially. Is that true? I also plan on discussing this with my college counselor next week too. What do you guys think about this?

Vets have one of the highest rates of burn-out, just keep that in mind. I'm not trying to kill your dreams, just be aware it's a huge issue with the profession.
 
Vets have one of the highest rates of burn-out, just keep that in mind. I'm not trying to kill your dreams, just be aware it's a huge issue with the profession.

And our suicide rate is approximately 4x that of the general population, which is more than twice that of military veterans. I find that incredibly hard to believe.
 
I wanted to emphasize this as well. At a run-of-the-mill SA GP, there will be a lot of repetition, even with sick patients (vomiting/diarrhea work up, for example). I know each place is different, but a lot of the potentially cool cases get referred out - which I support 100%, because I want the diagnosed figured out, the patient better and the owners happy, but it doesn't really lend itself to the reality-TV-esque lifestyle. That doesn't mean vet med can't be ever-changing and exciting, but GP is usually not the place to find that level of unpredictability.

Agree with TRH and chickenlittle
I'm in mixed animal and still run into extremely repetitive days. The small animal is the same stuff 90% of the time, same convo about atopy/diarrhea/dental over and over. And you can only do so many coggins before that stops being exciting- but at least I get to drive around the countryside a bit for that.
 
I think a lot of corporate practices have policies preventing pre-vets from hanging there much. I don't know whether it's 25% of them, 50%, or 75% (you know what I mean), but.... the three I'm most familiar with all don't allow it except for veterinary students on externship. So it's probably easier to get experience at the type of clinic that isn't necessarily representative of what life will be like after graduation. Kinda sucks.

What is Banfield's pre-vet policy? If they allow them, or leave it to the discretion of the doctor, that wouldn't honestly be a bad place for a pre-vet. So many of my classmates ended up working at a Banfield.....

Does VCA have a policy, or is it clinic-by-clinic? (I'd suspect the latter, since they reportedly are more hands-off at the individual clinic level.)

There are plenty of exceptions. People just need to hunt for them and be bold about asking for a chance to observe.

I'm certainly willing to take on shadows/etc, but pre-vets don't usually want to hang in an ER. And it can be kinda weird - tends to feel like feast or famine where there's absolutely nothing going on except tv-watching, or you've got 6 hospitalized cases, 1 that you need to roll into surgery, 3 in exam rooms, and a few waiting in the lobby that were triaged as 'stable but need to be seen'. In which case, a shadower who isn't smart about staying out of the way could be a real annoyance. So we don't get many. We do get a fair number of 4th years on externship, though.

The one I worked at has had a few people shadow. I think it was more up to the vet that would be on that day and the practice manager. My location as a whole was pretty laid back and not too pushy about the numbers.
 
Is it really that hard to believe though?

I posted this to my fb the other day. It's definitely worth a read.

http://www.beva.org.uk/news-and-events/news/view/763

The high suicide rate is not hard to believe it all. I guess I just didn't realize that veterans had such a comparatively low suicide rate, with all the talk about their need for mental health services. Where's the public health outcry over US?!
 
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I'm at a VCA now and I don't know if it's a company-wide policy but we do have a shadow regularly. He isn't allowed to do anything but observe. No touching a patient at all. We have a couple high school or early college aged people who are hired as technician assistants. They get more hands on experience I suppose but even then they are mostly limited to cleaning cages and restraining for the techs rather than directly helping the doctors much for the first year or so it seems.

I shadowed at VCA clinic as well and had a similar experience. The only thing I could do was help restrain fractious cats that required multiple people. Other than that, hands off.
 
And our suicide rate is approximately 4x that of the general population, which is more than twice that of military veterans. I find that incredibly hard to believe.

I don't.

We get burned out because we're constantly in this tension of wanting to be able to help our patients, and more often than not the owners don't have the resources to do it, or don't want to spend the resources to do it. So we walk away feeling ****ty about 2/3rds of our cases with a "well, I did what little I could.... bummer for the animal".

And then on top of it, while we're practicing sub-par medicine (by owner dictate, not by choice) - at the same time we have to listen to various people talk about what crappy doctors we are because all we want to do is steal clients' money, or how our pockets are being lined by big pharm (stillllll waiting for my first check - when does that arrive, btw?) or big food companies (ditto - did I just miss where we sign up for the free 4-week vacation to exotic locations????).

And then on top of THAT, we see a TON of patients die comfortably and without pain (by our hand), and we occasionally get to sit there and watch them suffer their way through death because of owners who insist on a 'natural death' (those are the ones that put my staff in a foul mood all shift), and so we start thinking to ourselves: "Geez - I know how *I* want to go out."

And we have access to those drugs.

(Just out of curiosity - amongst veterinary suicides, I wonder what the 'type of death' statistics look like compared to the regular population? I.e. medication overdose, gunshot, whatever.)
 
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The high suicide rate is not hard to believe it all. I guess I just didn't realize that veterans had such a comparatively low suicide rate, with all the talk about their need for mental health services. Where's the public health outcry over US?!

There's, what, 100k veterinarians in the U.S. There's 22M veterans.

I think that explains it as much as anything? Maybe?
 
Sure, but in almost all of the rest of the civilized world, it's provided. And she did say "financial freedom" to do it; paid leave is just another way to have the financial freedom to do it. :)

Very true, but I've accepted that will never happen in this country (at least not in the Southern red state in which I live!)... so I just need to be able to have 7 weeks' pay saved up to cover the portion of my leave that won't be covered by short-term-disability. I'd love to have more than 12 weeks and I'd love it all paid, but I'm trying to be at least SOMEWHAT realistic :)
 
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Has anyone seen the survey on the front page of VIN today? They broke it down into a many more small categories than this, but the basic gist of it (after 1500 responses) is that roughly 16% of vets consider vet med to be the focus of their life (either voluntarily or involuntarily), 38% say it's an integral part of their being but they have other interests, ~30% define it as 'just a job' or a paycheck, and 12% actively want out. On the plus side, that means a little over half of the responding vets are somewhat passionate about their work. On the downside, nearly half of responding vets either want out or are hanging in there only for the paycheck. I would not have ever imagined that when I went to vet school, and I think a lot of these prevet students don't realize that could be them someday.
 
(Just out of curiosity - amongst veterinary suicides, I wonder what the 'type of death' statistics look like compared to the regular population? I.e. medication overdose, gunshot, whatever.)

Did my senior paper on the veterinary suicide stats (can't you tell I was in a grand mood when it was time to pick paper topics) ;) Pulling this from my paper. The citation formatting is a bit messed up in the copy paste, but it works out.

"Deliberate self-poisoning is the most common method of suicide in both male and female veterinarians, accounting for 76 percent of male and 89 percent of female veterinary suicides. This is compared with 20 percent of males and 46 percent of females in the general population.14 Veterinarians and pharmacists have the highest rates of self-poisonings,14 yet veterinarians have a higher suicide rate. Access to drugs is not the sole determining factor. It may not be why a practitioner commits suicide; it may only affect how they do. Suicide rates among doctors are slightly elevated even when deaths by medicines are excluded, suggesting that the ready availability of lethal means is not the only factor increasing the suicide risk.15 Access to lethal substances is only one small part of the bigger picture."


14. Kelly S, Bunting J. Trends in suicide in England and Wales. Population Trends. 1998: 92: 29-41.

15. Reichenberg A, Maccabe J. Feeling the pressure: work stress and mental health. Psychological Medicine: 2007: 1073-1074.
 
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Has anyone seen the survey on the front page of VIN today? They broke it down into a many more small categories than this, but the basic gist of it (after 1500 responses) is that roughly 16% of vets consider vet med to be the focus of their life (either voluntarily or involuntarily), 38% say it's an integral part of their being but they have other interests, ~30% define it as 'just a job' or a paycheck, and 12% actively want out. On the plus side, that means a little over half of the responding vets are somewhat passionate about their work. On the downside, nearly half of responding vets either want out or are hanging in there only for the paycheck. I would not have ever imagined that when I went to vet school, and I think a lot of these prevet students don't realize that could be them someday.

Interesting! Though - it may be a little myopic in one sense. We're sitting here saying that it sucks that 50% are in it only for a paycheck or actively want out - but I bet you'd be hard pressed to find many other fields where that wasn't the case, or worse. The difference here (and now) is the crippling debt that prevents that move out for many (most?) new vets. That factor isn't present in most other fields.

Thanks for the suicide info, @lailanni .... Kinda scary numbers.
 
Did my senior paper on the veterinary suicide stats (can't you tell I was in a grand mood when it was time to pick paper topics) ;) Pulling this from my paper. The citation formatting is a bit messed up in the copy paste, but it works out.

"Deliberate self-poisoning is the most common method of suicide in both male and female veterinarians, accounting for 76 percent of male and 89 percent of female veterinary suicides. This is compared with 20 percent of males and 46 percent of females in the general population.14 Veterinarians and pharmacists have the highest rates of self-poisonings,14 yet veterinarians have a higher suicide rate. Access to drugs is not the sole determining factor. It may not be why a practitioner commits suicide; it may only affect how they do. Suicide rates among doctors are slightly elevated even when deaths by medicines are excluded, suggesting that the ready availability of lethal means is not the only factor increasing the suicide risk.15 Access to lethal substances is only one small part of the bigger picture."


14. Kelly S, Bunting J. Trends in suicide in England and Wales. Population Trends. 1998: 92: 29-41.

15. Reichenberg A, Maccabe J. Feeling the pressure: work stress and mental health. Psychological Medicine: 2007: 1073-1074.

While I agree that access to drugs is not the sole determining factor, I'm somewhat confused with the portion of your paper you posted here. Veterinary to non-veterinary suicides through poisoning are roughly 4:1 (male) and 2:1 (female), but rates are only slightly elevated when you exclude medicines. How much is slightly? If the remaining difference between slightly and the percentages that lead to 4x and 2x suicide rates is influenced heavily by drugs, then I'd still say availability of those drugs factors in quite a bit.

I'll pull up those articles.

Has anyone seen the survey on the front page of VIN today? They broke it down into a many more small categories than this, but the basic gist of it (after 1500 responses) is that roughly 16% of vets consider vet med to be the focus of their life (either voluntarily or involuntarily), 38% say it's an integral part of their being but they have other interests, ~30% define it as 'just a job' or a paycheck, and 12% actively want out. On the plus side, that means a little over half of the responding vets are somewhat passionate about their work. On the downside, nearly half of responding vets either want out or are hanging in there only for the paycheck. I would not have ever imagined that when I went to vet school, and I think a lot of these prevet students don't realize that could be them someday.

Thanks for this. I'm a pre-vet student, and I'm listening! Like LetItSnow said, I think regardless of career, you'll have similar brackets of individuals, except many have a mortgage or two worth of debt following vet school.
 
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We're sitting here saying that it sucks that 50% are in it only for a paycheck or actively want out - but I bet you'd be hard pressed to find many other fields where that wasn't the case, or worse. The difference here (and now) is the crippling debt that prevents that move out for many (most?) new vets. That factor isn't present in most other fields.

I suspect our stats aren't any worse than any other field (though I really have no idea). The difference, though, is that you don't often hear folks going into other fields saying things like "I don't care what this career will do to my finances, I want it!" and "I know I'll be in debt forever, but it'll be worthwhile because I'll be doing what I love!!" (I realize that not all pre-vets say that, but many do and I was one of them!!) I think it's important to recognize that vet med is just like any other job in that it is very likely that you will someday be doing it just for the paycheck. And while there's not anything wrong with that, it starts to make the debt more stifling when you realize you could be making that same paycheck in any number of other fields with a heck of lot less debt. Yes, there will be some who love vet med and consider it the sole focus of their life, but there an equal number who hate it.... and for the people who don't fall at either of those two extremes, there's almost a 50% chance that they'll someday view vetmed as 'just a job.' Just something to consider.
 
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Interesting! Though - it may be a little myopic in one sense. We're sitting here saying that it sucks that 50% are in it only for a paycheck or actively want out - but I bet you'd be hard pressed to find many other fields where that wasn't the case, or worse. The difference here (and now) is the crippling debt that prevents that move out for many (most?) new vets. That factor isn't present in most other fields.

Thanks for the suicide info, @lailanni .... Kinda scary numbers.

Yeah......that 50% includes those that say their job is a paycheque, but they would also be happy doing something else. There's nothing wrong with that attitude, IMO......it really doesn't mean that they're in it only for a paycheque - it does say they are happy doing what they're doing, but it's not the only thing they could do that would likewise make them happy. And it includes those who say they love their job, but their "real life" exists outside of veterinary medicine - also not a bad attitude either. Probably healthier to define your "real life" as your spouse/kids/grandkids than have vet med be your "real life". Of the over 1800 votes (now), there's only about 11% who say they wish they could retire or find a job doing something else.
 
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