I wouldn鈥檛 blame you for thinking something along the lines of 鈥渏ust like everyone else,鈥� but I鈥檓 here to tell you otherwise.
Being a veterinarian is a lot like being a human doctor. Besides the fact that both professions practice medicine, albeit on different subjects, they both require top grades and many years of school. They usually necessitate one to go into debt, to work long hours, to have extreme empathy and to be on call for days at a time.
Given their similarities, we鈥檇 expect them to have similar mortality rates and causes of death, but that isn鈥檛 the case. Veterinarians are at an extremely elevated risk for.
Studies find that veterinarians are between times more likely to 聽than the general population. 聽 found a greater than 100% increase in suicides, and found that 19% of respondents had seriously considered suicide, with 9% having made attempts. These risks seem to exist for vets.
But why though? These high rates mirrored in their human-treating counterparts (though do find the rates of suicide in physicians elevated, but to a lesser extent), and appears to directly oppose the correlation between rates and.
Studies have identified a few risk factors in particular. General stress, similar to that experienced by a human doctor, is caused by long hours, high stakes, low levels of support and heavy workloads. Like doctors, veterinarians have a deep knowledge of, and access to, drugs that could end their lives. Indeed the of vets seem to end their lives聽via.
While doctors may work in hospitals or offices with many coworkers, veterinarians often work in small clinics, or even alone. They can鈥檛 often refer patients to experts, consult with coworkers or even ask for help. The resulting isolation has been as a major risk factor for vet suicide.
Most veterinarians love animals. If they were in it for the money, they鈥檇 have gone into medical school instead (Human make on average twice what do, and vet schools are usually than med schools). But care for your patients can rapidly cause , especially when dealing with .
Veterinarians are the first line response for cases of animal abuse, and are responsible for reporting when they think an animal is being abused. But these reports aren鈥檛 always taken seriously by law enforcements.
Animals can鈥檛 advocate for themselves, and the relationships between owners and pets vary much more than the ones between human patients and loved ones. An owner may stop at nothing to get their rabbit the treatment they need, but an attitude of 鈥渋t鈥檚 just an animal鈥� is quite common. 聽
In countries like Canada, with socialized health care, individuals rarely have to make decisions about their loved one鈥檚 health with cost in mind. But with veterinary medicine costs often play a role in what treatments occur. Owners may not give the same respect and trust to animal physicians as they would to human physicians.
Vets do have the , but they also have an to prevent animal suffering. If an owner is set on a treatment, they鈥檒l often just go elsewhere if refused, making it fairly futile for a vet to say no.
This can lead to an animal experiencing undue stress while undergoing surgeries likely to fail, or it could mean perfectly healthy animals being euthanized. Owners may refuse to inject their diabetic cats with insulin because of their own fear of needles, regardless of the cat鈥檚 declining health, or be forced to let their rats be euthanized rather than pay for expensive medications. As animal lovers, these moments can be heartbreaking to a vet.
Euthanizing animals might be routine for vets, but that doesn鈥檛 mean it doesn鈥檛 affect them. that more than 90% of vets approve of euthanasia for humans. Veterinarians have a unique relationship with death, due to their close proximity to it, and many have cited this as a reason they consider suicide.
We, as a society, have done well acknowledging how difficult it can be to be a human doctor (possibly due to the influx of dramatic television portrayals of these difficulties). Now it鈥檚 time to do the same for vets.
have found that only about 50% of vets would enter the profession if they could choose their careers again. . We can鈥檛 ignore this, and we can鈥檛 .
Veterinary work is a tremendously difficult undertaking. The least we can do is acknowledge that difficulty.
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