What Does A Veterinary Physician Do?

two veterinary assistants

Veterinarian Job Description

One of the best career options is to go into medicine. The field of medicine can be a very tiring profession. But no career path is a bad one if you are passionate about it. If you love animals, and medicine, then you should definitely think about becoming a veterinarian.

What do they do?
The job description, like the word itself, is quite a mouthful. Simply put, vets take care of animals. But if you want to be thorough about it, a veterinary physician is a medical practitioner who diagnoses, treats and helps prevent diseases and injuries in animals. They perform surgeries, vaccinate, diagnose and medicate animals. They also regularly advise pet owners on how to best take care of their animal friends. Unfortunately, sometimes they are also required to euthanize the animals.

Different types of vet techs

There are many types of veterinarians depending on where they work and who they work with. Some of them are –

1. Companion animal
They are the most common types of animal doctors which provide simple services like inoculations, prescribing medicines, setting bones. etc. They perform surgeries too if the circumstances require it.

2. Veterinary practitioners
They have undergone advanced training in their respective fields and have expertise in a particular animal species like Avian (birds), Feline (cats), Canine (dogs) and many others.

3. Food animal
Their main focus is on farm animals which are being raised to be food sources. They primarily vaccinate animals and consult farmers on feeding, housing and general health of animals.

4. Food safety and inspection
These vets primarily work with the food industry. They conduct research on animal health and vaccinations. They also look after slaughtering and processing plants. They have to ensure that the government regulations are met in such places.

5. Research
Some veterinarians decide to go into research to try and find new ways to prevent diseases in humans and animals. They also test new drugs and surgical methods to improve the medical standards.

Veterinary Technician Specializations

Most of the veterinary technicians go on to become general practitioners. However, if you want, you may undergo a few more years of training to achieve specialization in some important roles in this career path. As a specialized veterinary technician, you also stand to earn more than a general practitioner. You could try to specialize in surgery, anesthesia, behavior, dentistry, dermatology, internal medicine, nutrition, pathology, zoology and many others.

Other Job prospects in the field

Being a veterinarian isn’t the only thing that you can do to work with animals. You could also try to become a veterinary technologist or a veterinary assistant. Both of these are equally respectable jobs. As mentioned above, you can also decide to specialize in particular field of veterinary medicine and make that your profession.

You can choose to join a research team working on various new drugs and ways to prevent diseases in animals and humans alike. Aside from these mainstream jobs, you could also take up teaching so you can help other potential candidates to become a veterinary technician such as yourself. One could also take up blogging or writing articles about this field as a side job to make a little bit of extra cash if needed.

As you climb the career ladder, you can get promoted to positions like Practice Manager or Field Manager. However, these jobs are more business oriented and the amount of time that you get to spend with animals is comparatively less.

At the end of the day, every job has its ups and downs. The weight of someone’s life in your hands and that is a huge responsibility. But, every time you save one it makes you feel a bit better. You also get to be around loveable creatures all day long. So if you love animals and medicine, go ahead and shortlist ‘veterinary technician’ as a possible career choice right now!