Pet owners may be running into delays when it comes to procedures with their cats and dogs. A worker shortage in the veterinarian industry has led some animal hospitals and clinics to delay surgeries and other work. Dr. Erin Howard is the president of the Michigan Veterinary and Hospital Association.
“We were having to operate in more of a human medical fashion here with triage situations in dealing with more of the emergent and urgent cases first, which needs to happen, but we’ve certainly seen now that we we don’t have enough hours in the day to be able to get to some of these other cases as quickly as we used to in the past.”
Howard says it’s not just veterinarians that are in short supply, but also office workers. The Association is trying to alleviate the problem by expanding veterinary class sizes and finding ways to retain workers.
