I enjoyed Mark Cushing’s article “4 Threats to Sustained Growth” [June/July 2021]. His No. 3 threat was “no midlevel professionals.”
Although the notion of adding a category of veterinary caregiver equivalent to the nurse practitioner in human medicine seems interesting, the elephant in the room wasn’t addressed but is related to the first two threats: the shortages of veterinarians and CVTs. If we don’t have sufficient interest from young people to pursue careers as DVMs or CVTs, where will we find a sufficient pool of individuals interested in an intermediate-level career?
Solving the shortages would make the creation of intermediate-level positions unnecessary. Wouldn’t it make more sense to devote efforts to curing the shortages than create a position and deal with the practical and logistical issues that come with recruiting, training and licensing?
Likely, as Mr. Cushing suggests, some veterinarians see veterinary nurses as a potential threat to their livelihoods. I am not among them. It will be interesting to see what transpires over the next decade as our profession deals with these threats.