Working as a veterinary nurse is probably the toughest job you’ll ever love. Veterinary nursing is rewarding if you love working with animals. Unfortunately it is also the kind of job where you have to be able to deal with the unfortunate accidents and injuries that happen to innocent animals, and still be able to maintain your professional detachment.
One of the crazy things (though crazy in a good way) about veterinary nursing (also known as veterinary technologists or technicians) is that they are in high demand. You wouldn’t think that there would be a great deal of these jobs available, but the outlook for this particular job is that it will grow by over 38% by 2018, that’s a tremendous leap!
There are many things that are contributing to this rise in available jobs. Part of it is due to more people looking for actual veterinary care for their pets, and also the fact that many veterinary practices are looking to cut costs by employing more technicians than actual veterinarians (who are more expensive to employ).
With all these new jobs coming available, it is important to understand what is needed in order to go to work in the field of veterinary medicine and to be successful at your job. So what all is entailed in the job? Not only that, how can you go about getting training to work in the field?
Some of the things you’ll find in this job description include being able to work under the direction of a licensed veterinarian. Whether you work in a private practice or for a research center, you will be working under the supervision of someone else, so you need to be able to take orders and follow directions to provide them with the information that they need. You will also be required to perform certain kinds of medical tests on animals as well as be able to treat certain kinds of conditions, give shots, take blood or tissue samples, develop X-rays, and help with dental care, flea dipping and a thousand other types of activities that are involved in the care and treatment of animals in any location.
Not all jobs as a veterinary technician are working in a private practice or animal’s hospital; some of them involve working in universities or research facilities that are conducting research using animals as the test subjects. This particularly can be a tough job for an animal lover, so you have to determine if this is the kind of work that you would be able to do.
In order to work in this field, however, you will need to get your vet tech training at a school or training center that offers the courses you will need. There are a variety of programs available, from associates and bachelor’s degrees to certificate programs that will have you out and ready to work in as little as 12 months. Most of the degrees and certificate programs will prepare you for a certification exam that you will need to pass in order to prove to your prospective employer that you have the skills that they need.
The pay for these positions varies from about $8.00 per hour in more rural area to closer to $12.00 per hour in larger metropolitan areas. However, the more experience you have, the better the pay, and while entry level jobs range from $20,000 per year to $30,000 per year, having over four year of experience brings the pay up to $22,000 – $34,000. Of course the more experience you have, the better off your pay will be, with technologists with over ten years of experience bringing in close to $45,000 a year, which really isn’t bad at all.
While the pay is not the highest for a medical profession, the real compensation comes for animal lovers who truly enjoying working with and caring for their charges, and for whom the chance to spend a good portion of their day with animals is a reward in and of itself.
Putting aside the times when you will find it a sad job, being a veterinary nurse can be a fantastic career for anyone who cares to devote their lives to the care of animals, but it is well worth it should you decide that it is for you.
