Veterinary Medicine: A Case Study

Words: 1720
Pages: 7

In today's world veterinarians suffer from depression and suicidal thoughts due to work related stress, debt from years of study, and personnel attachments to their patients. This is a serious topic that we need to bring awareness to. When a veterinarian is emotionally invested in a patient it can affect their mental wellness if they must euthanize them. The increasing cost of surgery and medicine in the veterinary field has given veterinarians a bad reputation because people do not want to pay so much which increases veterinarians stress. Some ways to cope with the stress is doing fun exercises, meditation, or listening to music. Throughout this paper we will be looking at articles that explore the topic of veterinary depression, work related …show more content…
This has brought to light that burnout and stress has been an increasing problem in veterinary medicine. Among all other occupations veterinarians are reported to have the highest incident rate of suicide. It has been reported among physicians that female and inexperienced veterinarians have higher stress levels than male or experienced veterinarians. Clients regard their animals as beloved family members this increases their expectations not only in their medical treatment, but emotional needs being met. Due to this fact the bond-centered approach used in veterinary medicine is the most effective way to build a client relationship which will increase their likelihood of following the veterinarian's treatment recommendation. In order to take the bond-centered approach veterinarians must maintain an emotional connection with their clients, this can cause emotional stress when traumatic events happen to their patients. Effective ways to prevent compassion fatigue or burn out are to deal with stress using problem-focused or emotional-focused strategy. Problem-focused strategy is when we tackle the problem giving us stress head on. While emotional-focused strategy is coping by normalizing feelings that result from stress. Some great strategies for dealing with stress is listening to music, going for a walk-in nature, or …show more content…
Their depression could come from other sources like not having the right support when coming home from work and not from job burnout. The surveys do not take into consideration effects their home life has on their everyday performance at work. Some examples are if the veterinarian is coming home to a nonunderstanding or abusive spouse it will affect how they operate at work and can increase the depression with all the other stresses of being a vet. Most likely their suicidal thoughts and depression comes from more than just their