Should I find new experiences?

[starfish229]

---

Members don't see this ad.

I currently work full time as a veterinary assistant in a small animal clinic. I’ve been here for about a year so far, I started working full time right after I graduated. I looove the people and the doctors there, so I can’t imagine leaving any sooner than expected (I’m hoping I’ll be accepted to vet school, so I will leave this practice when I have to move).

Recently I’ve been feeling like the job is very monotonous, and I’m no longer getting as much hands on learning as I did when I first started. I’m doing a lot of labs and pharmacy and caring for our hospitalized cats. Our schedule is changing next week and I’ll actually be assigned to a doctor for their appointments each day instead of just floating around, so maybe that slight change will help make my days more hands on and exciting.

I also started helping out at a sheep and goat farm, so I’ve been very hands on with them - tail docking and castrating, vaccinations, lambing, hoof trims, etc. I’m doing that a few mornings a week when I’m available.

Working as a veterinary assistant full time is great and I’m working under wonderful veterinarians so I want to take as much advantage of this opportunity as I can, but at this point I’m not sure how much more I can grow and learn here if it’s been this dull for a while. I would love to stay here and also start up at an emergency clinic nearby just to learn about another area of vet med. Do you think the doctors will be understanding about that? I don’t want to be a burden, causing them to lose a full time staff member and having to change the schedule around yet again. Would it look better on my applications to have experience in more than one animal hospital? I have probably around 2000 hours of vet experience at this point, and by the time apps close I’ll have around 3000

 

[TheGirlWithTheFernTattoo]

I had the similar issue of getting “bored”, or wanting more variety than what I was getting to see since my employment clinic is tiny and turfs all emerg cases.

What worked for me was finding vets that contract out to hospitals and shadowing them. I’ve done this for quite a while now, and love it. I get to go along to clinics all over town for cool procedures and see how they all do things differently at different companies. This also means the hours are small enough that it doesn’t impact my employer like having a whole other job would. The people I have done this with was someone who did ultrasounds and some more advanced surgeries for clinics, and then (currently) I am with an IM subspecialist. I have not quit my job, and staying there has resulted in a very strong LOR.

You just have to be careful about respecting privacy of all of the clinics, and not passing along stories. Also make sure your boss is okay with it; I’ve found people are very understanding of you wanting to get more experiences and don’t take it personally. If it all works out well, I do think it is an excellent way to get more variety.

 

[that redhead]

I currently work full time as a veterinary assistant in a small animal clinic. I’ve been here for about a year so far, I started working full time right after I graduated. I looove the people and the doctors there, so I can’t imagine leaving any sooner than expected (I’m hoping I’ll be accepted to vet school, so I will leave this practice when I have to move).

Recently I’ve been feeling like the job is very monotonous, and I’m no longer getting as much hands on learning as I did when I first started. I’m doing a lot of labs and pharmacy and caring for our hospitalized cats. Our schedule is changing next week and I’ll actually be assigned to a doctor for their appointments each day instead of just floating around, so maybe that slight change will help make my days more hands on and exciting.

I also started helping out at a sheep and goat farm, so I’ve been very hands on with them - tail docking and castrating, vaccinations, lambing, hoof trims, etc. I’m doing that a few mornings a week when I’m available.

Working as a veterinary assistant full time is great and I’m working under wonderful veterinarians so I want to take as much advantage of this opportunity as I can, but at this point I’m not sure how much more I can grow and learn here if it’s been this dull for a while. I would love to stay here and also start up at an emergency clinic nearby just to learn about another area of vet med. Do you think the doctors will be understanding about that? I don’t want to be a burden, causing them to lose a full time staff member and having to change the schedule around yet again. Would it look better on my applications to have experience in more than one animal hospital? I have probably around 2000 hours of vet experience at this point, and by the time apps close I’ll have around 3000

I would encourage you to get experiences outside of just small animal GP work. Not saying to leave your current job, but I think spending more time with the sheep/goats would be worth your while; the ER would be good too as it's different than GP. However, consider that a lot of the species you'll be working with and tasks that you will be doing as an assistant will be nearly the same.

As for inconveniencing the current place, that's something that only you/the schedule maker can truly know how much of a pain it will be. Certainly there will be some level of inconvenience for them but you have to decide if the benefit of gaining breadth of experience is worth it.