In 2020, members of the AAEP Wellness Committee created an Emergency Coverage Survey, which had more than 800 respondents. At that time, only 8% of respondents utilized a cooperative model for emergency coverage. They named various reasons for not using a cooperative, including:
- Not enough local practitioners to form a group.
- Loss of control over patient care and concern over the level of care or diagnostic skill provided by local colleagues.
- Treatment of other species would be required.
- Concern they would need to cover too large of a geographic region.
- Concern over loss of clients to other practices.
- Concern over loss of needed revenue.
- Concern about other practices’ fees being too high or too low.
- Fear that their clients would be disappointed or angry.
Amanda McCleery, DVM, addressed each of these concerns in her 2021 AAEP Convention presentation “Better Together: Utilizing an Emergency Cooperative to Prevent Burnout.”
Equine Emergency Coverage Strategies
In 2023, the AAEP Commission on Equine Veterinary Sustainability’s Emergency Subcommittee suggested veterinarians take the following actions to regain control of their personal and professional schedules:
- Provide after-hours care only to current clients, and define a “current” client.
- Require clients to bring their horses to a central haul-in location to increase your efficiency and alleviate drive time.
- Limit your hours of emergency coverage. Meggan Graves, DVM, of the University of Tennessee College of Veterinary Medicine, reports only 2.6% of equine field emergency calls occur between 12-6 a.m. Providing instructions on how to proceed to a referral center during these hours reduces the burden on the practitioner.
- Use a third-party triage service to address your clients’ concerns and forward true emergencies to you.
- Charge appropriately, because after-hours care is overtime work for veterinarians. Compensating veterinarians for emergency work will increase their job satisfaction.
- Educate your clients about what constitutes an emergency. The more your clients understand when to call you, the fewer non-emergency calls you will receive.
- Reinforce your work hours by not responding to client convenience messages after hours.
- Use an auto-reply message that provides instructions for true emergencies and acknowledges you will respond to routine messages during regular hours.
Shifting Paradigms in Equine Emergency Coverage
Over the past few years, the tide has begun to slowly turn. A poll posted on the Facebook page Equine Vet-2-Vet in September 2024 garnered 502 votes on how veterinarians are transforming emergency coverage in their practices (respondents could vote for multiple options):
- 10% are using an emergency cooperative.
- 31% provide 100% of the emergency fee to the provider of the services.
- 3% provide 50% of the emergency fee to the provider of the services.
- 2% require haul-in to their facility for emergency care.
- 25% only provide emergency service to clients in good standing.
- 25% charge higher fees to nonclients for emergencies.
- 2% provide ER service only until late evening, then refer emergencies to referral centers.
- 1% use a triage service such as VetTriage.
- 1% pay a stipend to veterinarians for on-call shifts.
Final Thoughts
Clearly, there is still progress to be made. Equine veterinarians report that emergency coverage is one of the most stressful and exhausting parts of their job. It will be better for clients and their horses if veterinarians limit their after-hours services than if they develop burnout and leave equine practice.
Related Reading
- Business Briefs: What to Expect as a Relief Veterinarian
- The Business of Practice: Telemedicine Triage in Equine Practice
- The Business of Practice: Emergency-Only Practices
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