Cat Bite Ends Veterinarian’s Career [Podcast] copertina

Cat Bite Ends Veterinarian’s Career [Podcast]

Cat Bite Ends Veterinarian’s Career [Podcast]

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 Disability coverage for veterinarians is often treated like something you think about later, after the practice is stable, after the loans feel manageable, after life quiets down. In my conversation with Dr. Michelle Custead, a board-certified veterinary medical oncologist and practice owner, what stood out was how rarely “later” arrives on schedule — and how quickly an ordinary day can turn into a career interruption that no one planned for. Custead runs Ally Veterinary Specialty Center, a boutique referral practice in Waltham, Massachusetts. When we started talking about disability risk, she didn’t begin with dramatic scenarios. She began with the temperament of the profession. Veterinarians, she said, are “a really hardy bunch.” They work hands-on, do hard work every day, and tend not to center themselves. The attention stays on the animal, the client, the case. That mindset is part of what makes veterinarians good at what they do. It is also part of what delays income protection planning until it becomes urgent. When I asked why disability planning feels more culturally obvious for physicians and dentists than for veterinarians, Custead’s answer was blunt in its simplicity. Veterinarians aren’t taught to protect their income as part of training. They aren’t guided through “how to protect your wealth or your income.” And because many vets have made it through years of physically demanding work without being seriously injured, a quiet belief sets in: we’ve been fine so far, we’ll probably be fine tomorrow. The episode turns when Custead starts talking about the injuries she’s seen — not as horror stories, but as normal occupational events. Cat bite makes risk feel unavoidable Cats don’t bite like dogs. Custead described cat teeth as “little, teeny daggers” that can inject bacteria deep into tissue. The wound can close quickly, trapping infection underneath. She’s known “numerous” veterinarians who needed multiple surgeries on their hands to recover from a bite and the infection that followed. Those aren’t minor injuries in a profession built on dexterity, grip strength, restraint, injections, procedures, and physical control of frightened animals. To understand why that matters, you have to listen to the way she describes it. It isn’t dramatic. It’s matter-of-fact, almost routine. And that tone is the point. This kind of disabling event isn’t framed inside veterinary culture as “disability.” It’s framed as something that happens to people who do real work. That is exactly why disability insurance is so often delayed. Equine injuries push the point further. Custead has stories from colleagues in equine practice that are the kind of accidents no one imagines until they’ve heard them once. A horse leaning against a barn door and crushing a clinician’s hands. Fractures on both arms in an instant. A surgeon unable to operate. Again, the important detail isn’t just the injury. It’s how sudden it is, and how quickly “I’m fine” becomes “I can’t work.” There is a common assumption that veterinarians are less exposed than human clinicians. Custead argued the opposite. Many human physicians are not at meaningful risk of being bitten or kicked at work. Veterinarians are. Some veterinarians develop allergies to pets that can worsen over time. And many vets carry the same scale of educational debt as physicians — hundreds of thousands of dollars — without the same institutional compensation structure. When the conversation moved from individual disability to practice ownership, Custead’s perspective shifted from personal planning to operational continuity. As a practice owner, she now feels responsibility not only to colleagues and patients, but to payroll, employees, and their livelihoods. The question becomes: if the doctor can’t work, what happens to the people and patients who depend on that doctor? That’s when disability stops being a personal product decision and becomes a business resilience issue. Custead described building her practice from the ground up and trying to create a culture different from what she had seen elsewhere — a practice where clinicians feel supported and seen by leadership. She spoke about the split that often appears in medical businesses: business leadership in one silo, medical staff in another, with limited communication between them. That disconnect, she said, can generate resentment and burnout because staff don’t understand the decisions being made and don’t feel protected. The conversation does not stay in the safe territory of physical injury. Custead raised a more difficult risk: veterinary mental health. She said that among medical professions, veterinarians are often cited as having an unusually high suicide rate, and that the profession has built a movement around the idea of “Not One More Vet.” She described hearing, with disturbing regularity, about colleagues who have died. ...
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