Pet Doctors New Graduate Programme

Pet Doctors Veterinary Clinics was founded in 1998 by David Hodges and Garret Turley. Friends since their first year at veterinary school, they had decided that they both had the same ideas about the level of care and service that should be offered to pets and their owners. The first Pet Doctors clinic was in Chichester, West Sussex and the company has grown substantially since then.

Pet Doctors now employs over forty veterinary surgeons, over seventy qualified veterinary nurses and forty other clinical support staff in its 28 well-equipped, air-conditioned clinics across Sussex, Hampshire, Surrey, Cambridgeshire and the Isle of Wight. We place importance on the bonding of clients to our community clinics: the whole of our veterinary team delivers compassionate care, quality of service and value for money, thus creating happy clients and happy vets. We pride ourselves on the level of care we show towards both our clients and our staff.

The New Graduate Programme

This programme starts in late Summer 2009. We are recruiting 3 new graduates for this exciting opportunity. These veterinary surgeons will be placed in either Guildford, Shalford & Chichester Pet Doctors veterinary clinics to work alongside two of our best teams. There are well structured consulting and operating times backed with a team of nurses and receptionists who will give new graduates the opportunity to experience developing their clinical and commercial management within a successful clinic.

At a clinical level they will have access to an experienced vet to guide them through the consultation process; how to approach preventative healthcare; how to structure work-ups after the initial clinical presentation, how to meet the needs of the client. They will develop confidence with routine, and the common non-routine, surgical procedures whilst being supported by colleagues. They will have access to, and training in medical diagnostics. A strong emphasis is placed on learning; in addition to receiving a budget for continuing education, they will be able to attend internal CPD events held by European Diploma holders. The pay and benefits package is excellent, the working environment is stimulating and fun.

Not only do we want these veterinary surgeons to quickly develop their potential as first opinion small animal clinicians but we also want to teach them about the commercial aspects of veterinary practice.
Therefore part of the training process will cover topics such as Staff Management Skills and Consultation Communication Skills. This will help equip them for the challenges of running their own clinics in the future. On top of this we will run monthly clinical clubs, the topics covered are built around the request of the individuals but will include such topics as;
    

• Pet Doctors Clinical Guidelines and Protocols
• Radiography
• Opthalmology
• Ultrasound
• Dentistry
• Interesting cases

During the first 3 months the Graduate will have regular meetings with their Area Manager to assist with a smooth integration in to the Pet Doctors team.

Pet Doctors expectation would be that the Graduate after 12 months would demonstrate competence in the following areas;

Clinical Skills

We would expect the Graduate Veterinary Surgeon could perform the following procedures in a sole charge capacity:

• Bitch speys & dog castrates
• Rabbit speys & castrates
• Exploratory Laporotomy
• Splenectomy
• Thyroidectomy
• Aural Haematoma
• Tail Amputation
• Leg Amputation
• Enucleation
• Surgical Dental Extractions
• Radiographic positioning and interpretation
• Skin Biopsies
• Drain placement / wound management
• Treatment of blocked cat

Medical Procedures

• Treatment and stabilisation of diabetic ketoacidotic
• Treatment of fitting dog/cat
• Treatment of acute bloat (not GDV)
• Treatment and stabilisation of hyperthyroid cat
• Nasogastric tube placement in a cat

We would expect the Graduates would have completed their P.D.P within 12 – 15 months of starting with Pet Doctors.

Communication Skills

We expect that the Graduate Veterinary Surgeon should be skilled in:

•  effective client communication based on core values;
•  effective communication and recommendation of preventative healthcare, work-ups, promotions and nurse clinics;
•  communication and discussion of estimates with clients;
•  continuity, re-examinations and call-backs;
•  regular discussion with clinic partner of non-routine cases to aid learning and improve clinical decision-making;
•  proactive communication with manager regarding volume data and revenue expectation;
•  clear clinical notes;
•  effective communication with colleagues (vets, nurses, receptionists, managers).

After a successful completion of their first year the Graduate Veterinary Surgeon will be well armed with both clinical and managerial knowledge and experience, this will allow them the opportunity to develop their careers further. This could take the form of;

• Continuing to grow the clinic where first allocated
• Taking sole charge of a new or existing clinic
• Moving to another multi vet clinic
• Specialising in a particular clinical area
• Taking on management responsibility
• Assuming a management role.

They will be given the option of staying in their current veterinary clinic or moving within the group on the next stage of their career development.

Find out more!

Click on the link below to download our  New Graduate checklist and find out why working for Pet Doctors is the best choice!