 
THE AVMA:  
150 YEARS of EDUCATION, SCIENCE, and SERVICE  
Chapters 6 – 8

by  
American Veterinary Medical Association

Smashwords Edition
Published on Smashwords by:  
American Veterinary Medical Association  
1931 N. Meacham Road  
Schaumburg, IL 60173

The AVMA: 150 Years of Education, Science, and Service  
Chapters 6 – 8  
Copyright 2012 by American Veterinary Medical Association

ISBN 978-1-882691-27-2

All rights reserved. Without limiting the rights under copyright reserved above, no part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in or introduced into a retrieval system, or transmitted, in any form, or by any means (electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, or otherwise) without the prior written permission of both the copyright owner and the American Veterinary Medical Association.

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CONTENTS

[Chapter 6:  
ROOTED IN KNOWLEDGE: Education](tmp_87c9dc8b0aa3f70c8b87df9d7d069b2f_0qLYJw.ch.fixed.fc.tidied.stylehacked.xfixed_split_003.html#ch06)

[Chapter 7:  
AVMA IN ACTION: Advocacy](tmp_87c9dc8b0aa3f70c8b87df9d7d069b2f_0qLYJw.ch.fixed.fc.tidied.stylehacked.xfixed_split_007.html#ch07)

[Chapter 8:  
LASTING ALLIANCES: Partners](tmp_87c9dc8b0aa3f70c8b87df9d7d069b2f_0qLYJw.ch.fixed.fc.tidied.stylehacked.xfixed_split_008.html#ch08)
Chapter 6  
ROOTED IN KNOWLEDGE

David Banasiak

Over the past 10 to 15 years, many changes have occurred in the field of veterinary education. Several American universities are exploring plans to establish new veterinary schools, even as state and federal governments cut funding for education. Schools in the U.S. and Canada are raising enrollment rates to accommodate a growing demand among potential students. Interest in acquiring accreditation from the American Veterinary Medical Association's Council on Education is on the rise as veterinary schools around the world look to the COE's Standards of Accreditation as the gold standard and actively seek recognition under those requirements.

But this was not always the case. While the first veterinary school opened in France in 1761 and was followed by other schools in Great Britain, Germany, and across Europe, America throughout much of the 18th and 19th centuries remained largely indifferent to veterinary education. Thirty-six veterinary schools would be established in Europe before the first American school opened. Early American colleges focused their educational mission on preparing graduates to be ministers or priests. The publication "120 Years of American Education: A Statistical Portrait" estimated that prior to the Civil War, a quarter of all college graduates became ministers. Until the 1800s, America had no veterinary schools, and the few schools founded in the early 19th century were plagued by ignorance, apathy, and greed.

EDUCATION

VETERINARIANS GET NO RESPECT

When Dr. Joseph Bushman, a veterinarian practicing in Washington, D.C., during the Civil War, declined President Lincoln's request to serve as a veterinary sergeant in a cavalry regiment in the U.S. Army, his decision was about respect. In Dr. Bushman's native England, veterinarians were commissioned officers in the British army, an advanced rank justified by the high regard afforded veterinarians as trained professionals. Dr. Bushman, a graduate of the Royal Veterinary College in London who had also studied veterinary medicine in France, was a member of a select group of individuals in America: veterinarians who had graduated from a reputable veterinary school.

Dr. Bushman's refusal to serve at a lower rank was justified, and eventually he received a commission to serve in the Quartermaster Corps, where he was assigned to work in the Giesboro horse and mule depot of the Army of the Potomac. He would later be a lecturer at the Kansas State Agricultural College.

•

Nobody was laughed at more than the horse doctor. Horse doctors were suppose to be a coarse, ignorant group who had made a failure of blacksmithing or farming and had turned to 'doctoring.' That they actually knew anything about medicine was an absurd notion."

—Dr. R.J. Dinsmore  
in his book 'Hoss' Doctor

•

But the Army had good cause to disrespect Dr. Bushman's profession. During America's early years, veterinary education, when available, was of dubious quality. The young nation's growing population of livestock and horses was cared for by blacksmiths, farriers, physicians, and a few European-educated veterinarians. Those interested in practicing veterinary medicine trained themselves as best they could from the scant literature available. If they were lucky, they might apprentice themselves to a European-educated veterinarian. Dr. Charles Wood, third president of the United States Veterinary Medical Association, for instance, began his career as a blacksmith but switched to veterinary practice as a self-taught veterinarian.

When it came to receiving professional health care, companion animals fared even worse than horses and livestock during this period. As Katherine Grier writes in "Pets in America," veterinarians considered them useless animals and not worth the effort to treat. Pet owners didn't share this view of their pets and sought health care for them, which, when they could find it, was often provided by pet shop owners. Grier mentions that in 1884, George Walton, a Boston dog dealer, also advertised himself as a dog doctor.

THE FIRST TWO

The two veterinary schools operating in the U.S. before the Civil War—the Boston Veterinary Institute, which opened in 1854, and the New York College of Veterinary Surgeons, which opened in 1857—did little to dissuade the Army or the public of their skepticism toward the veterinary profession. These schools were privately owned and profit-driven, and their brief existence was troubled by squabbling, inadequately trained faculty; a lack of committed students; poor admission standards; and unethical behavior.

It is no wonder, then, that the term "horse doctor" took on a derogatory meaning, being a term that, with one meaning, marginalized the work performed by veterinarians by referencing only a single species treated and, with a second, ridiculed the inadequate and shoddy education received in veterinary schools of the time. Dr. R.J. Dinsmore in his book "'Hoss' Doctor" had this to say on the subject: "Nobody was laughed at more than the horse doctor. Horse doctors were supposed to be a coarse, ignorant group who had made a failure of blacksmithing or farming and had turned to 'doctoring.' That they actually knew anything about medicine was an absurd notion."

Faculty at the Boston Veterinary Institute frequently pressured the administration to admit uneducated students. The institute's president opposed these demands, and eventually, the struggle over admission standards became irrelevant when the school closed after four sessions, having graduated only six students.

Of the two early veterinary schools in the U.S., the New York College of Veterinary Surgeons is often considered America's first practical veterinary school. According to a Feb. 23, 1858, column in The New York Times, the NYCVS was "organized under appointment by its trustees of Capt. Ralston, as Veterinary Principal and Professor of Theory and Practice; Thos. D. Andres, M.D., as Professor of Anatomy and Physiology; and John Busteed, M.D., as Professor of Surgical Anatomy and Surgery." The article goes on to say that Ralston was an officer of cavalry in the British army and a graduate of the Royal Veterinary College.

The NYCVS' time span of operation, 1857-1899, was beset with internal divisiveness, resulting in faculty members and students breaking with the college to found rival schools. The severity of the discordance caused the college to suspend operations from 1873-1877. During this period, in 1875, Dr. Alexandre Liautard left after a quarrel, taking with him most of the students, to open the American Veterinary College in New York.

In 1877, another discontented group left to establish the Columbia Veterinary College. At the college's official opening in September 1878, The New York Times reported: "The college has been organized by Professors and students who seceded from the New York Veterinary College owing to a disagreement with the Board of Trustees."

Despite these struggles, the New York College of Veterinary Surgeons continued operations, becoming, as The New York Times reported in 1897, the first veterinary college to offer a special class for women interested in becoming veterinarians. Unfortunately, a Dec. 30, 1899, fire resulting in an estimated $20,000 loss and the death of 24 horses forced the college's closure. During its time span, the NYCVS graduated 291 students.

Another school that struggled to establish itself during this time was the Veterinary College of Philadelphia. Two attempts to open the college, in 1853 and 1857, both failed because of faculty disputes. The college was reorganized as the Pennsylvania College of Veterinary Surgeons, and in 1866, made its third attempt to open, but it folded by 1870 with a depleted treasury, having failed to attract a sufficient number of students. Dr. Robert Jennings, part of the group who worked to open the Philadelphia college, said it failed because "young men of education and respectability would not engage in a profession of so low a standing."

The New York College of Veterinary Surgeons  
Courtesy of the New York Public Library,  
Photographic Prints Collection
•

By studying the disease of our domestic animals we rescue them from the hands of quacks.

—Physician Benjamin Rush, 1807

•

The Pennsylvania College of Veterinary Surgeons was acquired by Dr. Robert McClure, who opened it as the Merchants' Veterinary College. Under Dr. McClure's leadership, the new college experienced its first commercial success. The college offered diplomas granting the degree of Doctor of Veterinary Medicine and Surgery for a fee of $100, or approximately $2,200 in today's dollars. But that was not all students received. Dr. McClure threw in several books he had written, including "Diseases of the American Horse, Cattle and Sheep." To add a touch of respect and authenticity, diplomas were issued under the name of the defunct Pennsylvania College of Veterinary Surgeons and included the forged signatures of creditable medical men.

Dr. McClure's success, however, was short-lived. The forged signatures drew the attention of the authorities, and in 1877, he was convicted of forgery and sentenced to nine months in jail and a $2,000 fine.

Dr. McClure's imprisonment was not the end of the college, though, as it continued to grant diplomas, offering instruction under a preceptorship system whereby students were apprenticed to practicing veterinarians.

VISIONARIES CALL FOR CHANGE

Before the carnage of the Civil War emphasized the need for trained veterinarians, visionaries observed that disease in animals could have an impact on human health. These forward-thinking men advocated for the study of veterinary medicine as a science and for the establishment of veterinary schools. The Philadelphia Society for Promoting Agriculture, with such famous members as George Washington, Benjamin Franklin, and Noah Webster, was at the forefront in the call for veterinary education. In 1805, Richard Peters, president of the Philadelphia Society, offered a gold medal for the best essay promoting veterinary knowledge and instruction.

Others added their voices to the call. In 1807, physician Benjamin Rush, delegate to the Continental Congress and signer of the Declaration of Independence, called on the Medical School of the University of Pennsylvania to create a veterinary department. He gave nine reasons why physicians should study the diseases of animals, the first being: "By studying the disease of our domestic animals we rescue them from the hands of quacks." Unfortunately, he went unheeded until 1884, when the university opened the Department of Veterinary Medicine.

While Rush's calls for a veterinary department would take years to germinate, hope for the improvement of veterinary education would come from another quarter. On June 9-10, 1863, a group of about 40 dedicated men met in New York City, guided by a petition advocating for the formation of a national veterinary association and condemning the inferior state of veterinary education. The petition, strongly promoted by the American Veterinary Association (of Philadelphia), also urged the advancement and diffusion of veterinary knowledge.

It stated: "Whereas, Veterinary Science in this country has been kept in comparative obscurity in consequence of its having been confined mainly to the hands of men uneducated in the anatomical and pathological relations of the various diseases to which our domestic animals are subject, as well also as to the therapeutic action of the remedies used in combating disease. This deplorable condition of the veterinary profession has been the means of excluding the qualified practitioner from the army in the United States. The losses to the national government in consequence from the purchase of large numbers of horses unfit for duties required of them, having amounted to millions of dollars...."

Conceived with a commitment to advance and promote veterinary education, the United States Veterinary Medical Association moved to achieve these aims by forming the Committee on Intelligence and Education in 1863 as one of its first standing committees. The CIE would become the grandfather of the current Council on Education, and it is one of the few committees of the AVMA to trace an unbroken lineage to the founding of the Association.

Documented activities of the Association's early years are meager and scarce, but it is known that in 1871, the USVMA passed a resolution calling for the New York College of Veterinary Surgeons to administer an entrance examination to "further the object of a higher grade of education." No record has been found of NYCVS's response to this request.

This resolution appears to be the Association's first attempt to persuade schools to improve the quality of veterinary education, but it had no effect. The fledgling Association had no muscle, no leverage to induce schools to adopt reforms. Many years would pass before their efforts would pay off, and during that time, the Association would require help from government agencies and the economics of the veterinary marketplace. The Association also would have to overcome the opinions and practices of its own members.

Equine anatomy dissection class at The Ohio State University, circa 1895

DO AS I SAY, NOT AS I DO

At least one prominent Association member was hypocritical in his calls for reform. Dr. Alexandre Liautard, the eighth and 14th president of the USVMA and the founder of the American Veterinary College (which served for many years as an unofficial headquarters of the Association), advocated higher standards for veterinary schools, including a three-year curriculum; however, he refused to adopt these standards himself and continued to maintain a two-year course of study at his college. His college also declined to participate when, in 1877–1878, the Association called for a congress of veterinary schools and veterinary departments at agricultural schools to discuss improvements in veterinary science standards and the veterinary curriculum.

As the editor of the American Veterinary Review, which later became the Journal of the American Veterinary Medical Association, Dr. Liautard used the Journal to criticize competing veterinary schools. After hearing that the new McKillip Veterinary College had opened in Chicago with a two-year program, he wrote in the September 1895 issue of the Review: "The McKillip Veterinary College will open as a two-year school. What a pity."

Dr. Louis Merillat notes another instance of Dr. Liautard's flip-flopping in the book "Veterinary Military History" when he relates Dr. Liautard's response to the 1897 decision of the Board of Regents of New York State to set a standard of a high school education as the matriculation requirement to attend a veterinary school. Dr. Liautard was quoted as saying: "The recent action of the Board of Regents of the State of New York at the instigation of our own State Society is a strike at the very foundation of the profession of veterinary medicine." Shortly after this incident, Dr. Liautard retired and returned to his native France.

Why the actions of the New York board of regents angered Dr. Liautard is a mystery, considering that five years earlier, in 1892, the USVMA unanimously adopted an amendment requiring that any future applicant for membership "shall be a graduate of a regularly organized and recognized veterinary school, which shall have a curriculum of at least three years, of six months each, specially devoted to the study of veterinary science, and whose corps of instructors shall contain at least four veterinarians."

Early photograph of the McKillip Veterinary College of Chicago  
Courtesy of the Veterinary Historical Collections,"  
Medical Sciences Library at Texas A&M University

Aerial view of the University of Pennsylvania, 1910

THE MORE THE MERRIER

From the end of the Civil War in 1865 until 1900, 32 additional veterinary schools opened in the United States. During that same period, 19 of those schools closed, some lasting only a couple years. No standardization of education existed between schools, and quality remained haphazard and irregular. The public was largely apathetic concerning the need for properly educated veterinarians, and even some members of the profession were unwilling to change or indifferent to reform.

Most of these early schools were privately owned, profit-driven businesses located in large cities, usually operating in livery stables, and lacking equipment and scientific laboratories, especially in the areas of histology, physiology, pathology, and chemistry. But there were exceptions.

Veterinary courses were also increasingly being offered at agricultural colleges and universities. Between 1868 and 1874, agricultural colleges in Illinois, Iowa, Massachusetts, and Ohio opened veterinary departments. By the late 19th century, 23 of 47 agricultural schools had professors of veterinary science on staff. However, the agricultural schools were not attempting to train veterinarians, but instead, to teach agricultural students enough veterinary skills to be their own animal doctors.

Although schools were rudimentary, competition for students was fierce. To gain an advantage, some schools established low admission standards, then waived these requirements altogether. Most schools required an elementary school diploma but lack of this prerequisite did not necessarily prevent admission, for the requirement was often waived if the applicant displayed maturity and possessed practical experience. Only a few required a high school education. Matriculation examinations, when given, were meant to impress applicants, not assess their abilities. In some cases, even illiteracy was not an impediment to admission.

The Upper Canada Veterinary School, which graduated its first students in 1866 and changed its name to the Ontario Veterinary College in 1897 when it became affiliated with the University of Toronto, advertised that applicants for admission must be able to read and write, but then waived that requirement for the first year, allowing students until the beginning of their second year to acquire literacy.

In 1890, the USVMA Committee on Intelligence and Education lamented that men "enter and graduated (veterinary school) who can barely write their own names." During this period, it appears that the most consistent admission requirement was a student's ability to pay the tuition.

Not all schools took a capricious approach to admissions. The Harvard University School of Veterinary Medicine's entrance examination required each applicant to read aloud a selected passage from ordinary English prose, write legibly and correctly an English composition of not less than 200 words, write English prose from dictation, and pass an arithmetic examination that included decimal fractions. An applicant also could take an optional examination in Latin, French, or algebra. The school's 1882 annual report to the Harvard University president recounted that one applicant took the optional examinations and "did himself great credit in all of them." That same year, two of 11 applicants failed the mandatory examination.

Even though Harvard's veterinary entrance examinations would appear to indicate strict admission standards, those standards were still considered low in relation to the standards required to enter the rest of the university.

Generally, the curriculum for most early schools was taught in two sessions (years) of four to six months each. Students in their first year were known as juniors and those in their second year as seniors.

The second year of veterinary study was often a repeat of the first, with the senior class given the privilege of occupying the front row seats of the lecture room. Sessions began in the fall, usually in the first or second week of October; however, students often began late, sometimes after the Christmas holidays.

There were no ramifications to this late start. Schools did not penalize students, as long as they passed their final examinations, and this was generally a foregone conclusion as long as a student's tuition was paid in full.

There were exceptions to the length of the school year. The Division of Veterinary Medicine at Iowa State College (established in 1879) required two years of nine months each, and the McKillip Veterinary College in Chicago (established in 1894) required three years of six months each.

When the Montreal Veterinary College opened its doors in 1866, it offered a three-year program of seven months each. At the time of its opening in 1882, Harvard University Veterinary School also offered a three-year program. Cornell University's rigorous program awarded a Bachelor of Veterinary Science degree after four years (of nine months each) of study and a Doctor of Veterinary Medicine degree after an additional two years.

Most schools' curriculum concentrated on teaching veterinary medical skills, but a few, such as the Montreal Veterinary College, focused their curriculum on teaching veterinary medical science as well as practical skills. Students at Montreal studied anatomy, therapeutics, and obstetrics at the veterinary college, then took classes in botany, chemistry, physiology, and histology at the McGill University medical school. Eventually, in 1889, McGill University took over the college, renaming it the McGill Faculty of Comparative Medicine and Veterinary Science. The faculty closed its doors in 1902.

Courses taught at the Harvard veterinary school included anatomy, physiology, chemistry, botany, medical chemistry, pathological anatomy, practical anatomy, and the theory and practice of veterinary medicine.

Like most aspects of these early schools, the quality of instructors was spotty. Faculty often consisted of poorly educated practitioners from the neighborhood, chiefly experienced in equine practice but with little general knowledge of veterinary medicine and no knowledge of pedagogy.

Instructors worked part time—conscious that time spent away from their practice meant lost revenue—delivering lectures and conducting demonstrations with whatever animal specimens were available, usually horse cadavers. These practitioner-instructors were also aware that they were teaching future business rivals. Dr. Merillat in his book "Veterinary Military History" quotes the lamentations of a graduate who studied under this conflict of interest: "They want our money but wish we'd drop dead as soon as we graduate."

There were also exceptions to the poor quality of instructors. Ontario Veterinary College consistently had an excellent staff of instructors led by an outstanding clinician.

Sometimes, instructors were not paid. The 1893 annual report for Harvard's School of Veterinary Medicine reports that Professor Whitney and Dr. Foss taught comparative pathology and the diseases of dogs without receiving pay. Other schools, such as the Kansas City Veterinary College in Missouri (founded in 1891), paid high salaries to their instructors.

Perhaps because of the scarcity of veterinarians, especially with the early schools, faculty members were not always veterinarians. The Chicago Veterinary College (founded in 1883) had only one veterinarian on its faculty. Human physicians often taught at veterinary schools. Several instructors from the McGill University Faculty of Medicine also taught at the Montreal Veterinary College.

Students at The Ohio State University, which opened its first veterinary hospital in 1891, examine farm animals in the barn attached to the hospital's small animal ward.
The Canadian Connection

The Canadian Veterinary Medical Association has collaborated with the AVMA Council on Education in the accreditation of veterinary schools in the U.S., Canada, and beyond for many years. Since the 1960s, a Canadian has participated on site visit teams as an observer. In 1976, a member of the Canadian VMA was welcomed to the COE as a representative. Today, a CVMA member is a full voting member of the council, working with AVMA members to create and uphold academic standards. The CVMA also sends a representative to participate in all accreditation site visits, domestic and international.

In addition to its accreditation work, Canada has a long history of educating American veterinarians. At one time, the Ontario Veterinary College graduated more American veterinarians than did all the U.S. schools combined. It is no wonder that some call Ontario the "cradle of veterinary science in America." The OVC is the oldest continuously operating veterinary school in Canada and the U.S. (The veterinary school at the National Autonomous University of Mexico in Mexico City, established in 1853, is the oldest operating veterinary school on the North American continent.)

Some consider 1862 to be the birth year of the OVC, for it was in that year that, with the support of the Board of Agriculture of Upper Canada, Dr. Andrew Smith, a graduate of the Royal (Dick) Veterinary School in Edinburgh, Scotland, began conducting lectures on veterinary medicine above Fleming's seed store in the old Agriculture Hall at the corner of Queen and Yonge streets in Toronto. However, Charles Mitchell, writing in the April 1938 issue of the Canadian Journal of Comparative Medicine, says: "... this is a mistake since the lectures were not given with the object of training veterinary surgeons but were very elementary lectures upon anatomy, materia medica and the common diseases of the horse. They were supplemental subjects such as are given in many agricultural colleges at the present day." These free lectures also did not lead to the awarding of a degree in veterinary medicine.

Members of the 1880 graduating class of the Ontario Veterinary College. Seated second from the right is Dr. S. Brenton, who went on to become the 1911 – 1912 AVMA president.

Etching of the Montreal Veterinary College  
Photo courtesy of the McCord Museum  
MP-0000.866.1

The government of Upper Canada recognized that a more substantial method for educating veterinarians was needed, so in 1864, a private charter was granted to Dr. Smith to found a veterinary school. The Upper Canada Veterinary School, also referred to as the Toronto Veterinary School, was born in 1864.

In 1897, the college became associated with the University of Toronto and changed its name to the Ontario Veterinary College. In 1921, it was relocated from Toronto to Guelph, and in 1964, it became a college of the new University of Guelph.

During the 1800s, Canada's Montreal Veterinary College was a beacon in veterinary education. With its long school year, extensive curriculum, top-notch admission standards, and dedicated, professional faculty, MVC trained students not only in the skills and techniques of veterinary practice but also in the science behind veterinary medicine. Veterinary students studied alongside McGill University medical students, achieving the same standards in education frequently enjoyed only by the human medical profession. Being on par with human medical doctors was what the veterinary profession struggled for during the 1800s.

In 1889, the college was taken over by McGill and renamed the Faculty of Comparative Medicine and Veterinary Science. Unfortunately, a high-quality education with arduous admission standards and a challenging curriculum was not favored by most veterinary students, who preferred instead to attend the less exacting two-year schools. Unable to compete for students, the faculty closed in 1902.

Left: Dr. Andrew Smith, founder of the Ontario Veterinary College  
Right: Dr. Duncan McEachran, founder of the Montreal Veterinary College

Illustration of the Harvard University School of Veterinary Medicine  
Courtesy of Special Collections,  
Fine Arts Library, Harvard University

THE MORE THINGS CHANGE, THE MORE THEY STAY THE SAME

By the end of the 1800s, veterinary education looked pretty much like it did during the middle of the century, except there were more schools, most of which remained deficient in areas such as admission standards, curriculum, facilities, faculty, and students.

The public and even the federal government continued to look down on the profession. Dr. Susan D. Jones in her book "Valuing Animals" relates the deliberations of the 48th Congress in 1883 on House of Representatives bill 3967, during which some congressmen referred to veterinarians as "illiterate horse doctors."

Efforts by the Association to improve veterinary education appeared to have accomplished little. The Association and the schools still bickered over entrance requirements, the number and length of academic years, and the curriculum. Private schools joined forces to oppose the new state-supported land-grant schools. State schools advocated higher entrance requirements and longer class times and felt that private schools were stealing students by offering a quicker route to a veterinary degree with their two-year programs and meager admission standards. Private schools resented the government support given to the state schools. Attempts by the Association to bring the schools together to discuss the issues were ignored.

In 1891, a Special College Committee of the Association reported that most schools favored a three-year program "but were prevented from attaining their desires through the short-comings of some neighbor (school)." Schools were afraid that if they implemented a three-year program, students would choose instead a two-year program with its more easily attainable veterinary degree, and that's just what most students did. Schools such as Harvard and Montreal with stringent standards were finding it harder to attract students.

In 1892, in a bold move to strengthen its hand and gain leverage in the push for educational reform, the Association adopted a measure requiring candidates for membership to be graduates of a recognized veterinary school with a curriculum of at least three years of six months each and a faculty comprising at least four veterinarians. No mention was made, however, as to how a school was to be "recognized."

At the 1893 annual meeting, Association President L.L. Williams noted that for the first time in the Association's history, more applicants for membership were refused than admitted. He attributed this to the 1892 membership requirements and commented that several schools were seeking Association recognition.

By the time of the 1896 annual meeting, the AVMA Committee on Intelligence and Education reported that of 18 schools, 14 now required a curriculum of three years. Only four had held this requirement before the Association made the three-year curriculum a stipulation of membership. Emboldened by this success, the Association called on schools to require a meaningful entrance examination, and in 1902, Association President J.F. Winchester recommended increasing the requirement for graduation to four years of study. He wanted to see veterinary health officers working in cities interpreting and administering laws related to public health alongside medical officers and knew that to make this happen, the profession needed to improve public trust in veterinarians and raise its members beyond mere animal doctor status. This could be achieved through improving education.

In 1894, the Association of Veterinary Faculties of North America was formed to give schools a forum for discussion and cooperation. Dr. Liautard harped against it, saying, "By what authority does the self-named Association of Faculties exist?" Despite his gripes, a representative of his college participated.

Veterinary college advertisements published in the American Veterinary Review

THE BUREAU STEPS IN

Even with the Association's new membership requirements, the state of veterinary education in the late 1800s was becoming worse instead of better. In what is referred to as the mushroom period, new schools popped up almost every year, with many ignoring the Association's requirements and forcing existing schools to lower their standards to compete.

The advent of the new century brought substantial changes to the profession and its education system. House of Representatives bill 3967, which occasioned the reference to veterinarians as illiterate horse doctors, called for the creation of a Bureau of Animal Industry, with its chief officer as a veterinary surgeon. Despite the hectoring, the BAI was created under the Department of Agriculture with a veterinarian as its chief.

The bureau became a major employer of veterinarians, which was especially important as more people traded their horses for automobiles. In 1921, the BAI employed more than 1,500 full-time veterinarians, about 10 percent of the profession. It also employed a large force of part-time veterinarians. One requirement for employment was graduation from a bureau-acceptable veterinary school.

The secretary of agriculture appointed a committee consisting of representatives of the AVMA (the USVMA changed its name in 1898), BAI, and Association of Veterinary Faculties to rate and categorize all veterinary schools according to BAI requirements. The report was released in 1908 and placed schools into three classes: A, B or C. Class A schools were acceptable; however, they were given a list of recommendations for improvement to remain on the acceptable list. Class B schools were considered unacceptable, and class C schools were new institutions that had not yet graduated a class but were considered unacceptable.

Only graduates of an acceptable school could sit for the civil service examination required for BAI employment. Eight schools failed to make the list, rendering their graduates ineligible for BAI employment.

For a school to remain on the bureau's acceptable list, it had to comply with a series of prescriptive recommendations. For example, schools were required to have a course of study consisting of three years of at least six months each. The course of instruction had to include a minimum of 150 days in each year and a minimum of 3,200 teaching hours for the entire three years. A school could not deviate from any bureau requirement, even to make its curriculum more stringent, and if a school wanted to change textbooks, it had to get bureau approval. The bureau also maintained a file on each student. As Dr. Susan Jones writes in "Valuing Animals": "... the BAI tracked the matriculation qualification, age, and professional movements of every student in the United States (whether they graduated or not)."

As the internal combustion engine superseded horsepower, employment opportunities for veterinarians dwindled, allowing the bureau with its numerous job opportunities to assert control over veterinary education through the 1920s, until the onset of the Great Depression shriveled away these employment prospects.

The National Association of Bureau of Animal Industry Veterinarians gathered for a banquet at the LaSalle Hotel in Chicago, December 1937.

LET'S AGREE TO DISAGREE

The AVMA's initial efforts at educational reform during the late 1800s were met with derision and resistance. By the 1900s, in contrast, the key players had agreed that veterinary education needed improving, but now they fought over what to reform and how extensive the changes needed to be.

Motivated by the bureau's acceptable list, schools began to implement the government's reforms, but the AVMA was not pleased. Meeting in 1908, the Committee on Intelligence and Education expressed concerns that the bureau's rigid curriculum requirements and faculty standards showed a disregard for sound teaching principles: "To say that a professor of anatomy must give at least 200 lectures and 300 hours of laboratory work is to interfere with a detail of pedagogy with regard to which the Secretary of Agriculture has positively no right to interfere.... Anatomy is a subject difficult to teach by lectures."

The USDA fired back, saying the committee was no more competent to say how anatomy should be taught.

But, the CIE would not roll over and cede the job of educational reform to the government. Beginning in the fall of 1916, it required schools to teach a four-year course of instruction, and beginning in 1920, schools were required to increase matriculation prerequisites to four years of high school. Unfortunately, the committee still had no leverage to enforce these requirements.

In 1921, the AVMA adopted minimum standards of education called the Essentials of an Approved Veterinary College. Among other things, these essentials specified that a college should have at least five major departments, each headed by a thoroughly trained veterinarian, possessing not less than five years of experience in the field. These essentials were the beginnings of the modern Council on Education Standards of Accreditation.

The renewed determination of the AVMA to reform education, the stringent requirements of the federal government, and the changing economic landscape hit the proprietary schools with a blow from which they could not recover. Based exclusively in urban environments and heavily reliant on horse owners as a client base, these for-profit schools could no longer recruit the large number of students needed to remain profitable. By 1927, they were no more.

The educational reforms had another effect on the profession. The National Defense Act of 1916 permitted the commissioning of veterinarians from the grades of second lieutenant through major, provided the veterinarian was a graduate of a recognized veterinary college.

Tuskegee University's first veterinary medical faculty.

THE COUNCIL ON EDUCATION

In 1928, an amendment to the AVMA Bylaws terminated the Committee on Intelligence and Education and created the Committee on Education. The new committee was composed of five members, each to serve for five years. At least three members had to be faculty members, but not more than one could come from any one school. The committee was charged with publishing an annual list of AVMA-recognized schools, and if needed, committee members were to inspect veterinary schools from time to time. However, site visits to schools were rare. School classification took place through questionnaires. But, in 1933-1934, all schools were inspected by at least one committee member. Despite this one-time visit, regular site visits of schools would not take place until the late 1940s.

By 1927, only 13 veterinary schools were operating in the U.S. Graduation rates had dropped substantially owing mainly to economic changes as the country moved from the horse to the automobile for its transportation needs. Only 1,040 students graduated between 1924 and 1930.

The economic base of veterinarians was shifting. More veterinarians were finding work with the government in the public health field. The profession began to see the value of companion animals and realized that providing health care for companion animals offered new opportunities for veterinary medicine. Schools offered more courses on small animal medicine.

The quality of education continued to improve as schools implemented more exacting requirements. Between 1931 and 1936, all U.S. schools required one year of pre-professional training, and by 1949, these schools required two years of pre-professional training.

In the early 1940s, several states planned to open new veterinary schools. Faculty and staffs of existing schools were depleted, owing to the manpower shortages of World War II, and the competition to staff new schools was leading to an educational crisis.

Circumventing the looming crisis would require an entity with the authority to assess the situation and implement necessary changes. To achieve this goal, the AVMA restructured the Committee on Education in 1946, replacing it with the Council on Education. Its membership was raised to nine, with each member serving a six-year term. Six members were appointees of the AVMA president. The remaining three were designated the executive committee, which was responsible for inspecting all veterinary schools at least once every three years and presenting a written report on each to the full council. The executive committee's members were elected by the AVMA Executive Board. Two of these individuals had to be teachers, one of basic science, the other of clinical science. The third was a general veterinary practitioner.

At its first meeting in May 1946, the COE revised the Essentials of an Approved Veterinary College, and then established a school classification system. Schools were classified as having full approval, council (secret) probation approval, public probation approval, or nonapproval.

Schools assigned council or public probation were reinspected annually. Because all schools of the time had substantial deficiencies, they were all initially placed on public probation. Inspections (site visits) by the three-member executive committee covered two days, with reinspections made by two members involving one to two days.

Throughout the next few decades, the COE duties expanded to reviewing and recognizing veterinary specialty groups, accrediting veterinary technology programs, and establishing a program to examine and verify the credentials of graduates of foreign veterinary schools.

Since the COE's creation in 1946, it has continued to improve the quality of veterinary education. The essentials were revised and expanded into the Standards of Accreditation. The membership increased to 20, and nonveterinary public members were included.

The Department of Education and the Council for Higher Education Accreditation have come to recognize the COE as the accrediting agency for colleges and schools of veterinary medicine in the U.S.

In 1973, the COE accredited its first veterinary school outside the U.S. and Canada when it granted accreditation to the Faculty of Veterinary Medicine at the State University of Utrecht in the Netherlands. In the 1990s, interest from other international schools rose. As of late 2012, the council had accredited 13 veterinary schools outside the U.S. and Canada, for a total of 46, counting the 33 U.S. and Canadian schools. Interest in AVMA COE accreditation continues to grow.
Other Educational Activities of the AVMA

Accrediting veterinary schools is just one aspect of the AVMA's involvement in education. The Association is also involved in the accreditation of veterinary technology programs through the Committee on Veterinary Technician Education and Activities, the certification of international education credentials through the Educational Commission for Foreign Veterinary Graduates, and the recognition of veterinary specialists through the American Board of Veterinary Specialties.

COMMITTEE ON VETERINARY TECHNICIAN EDUCATION AND ACTIVITIES

In the 1950s, the AVMA Council on Education was approached with proposals to create programs to train veterinary technologists—nonveterinarian medical professionals who would assist veterinarians in much the same way nurses assist medical doctors.

During its May 1953 meeting, the COE discussed a proposal from the University of Connecticut to establish a curriculum for the training of veterinary technologists. The council responded to the university that this type of curriculum was not advisable, and anyway, the council had no jurisdiction related to such a curriculum.

Ten years later, the COE was approached by two colleges requesting assistance in developing a curriculum for training veterinary technicians. The council discussed this request at its May 1963 meeting and decided that it had no responsibility to help these colleges. The matter was sent back to the AVMA executive secretary for distribution to another council. Interestingly, during its discussion, the council referred to veterinary technicians as "pseudoveterinarians," and it believed that an influx of them would take work away from veterinarians.

The council's harsh stance on veterinary technicians softened ever so slightly by 1966, when it approved a report from the Committee on Training Courses for Nonprofessional Veterinary Assistants, which stated: "The word 'Veterinary' should not appear in any title assigned to graduates of such courses. Such titles as Animal Technician, Animal Technologist, or Animal Nurse have been suggested."

By 1968, the COE's Committee on Nonprofessional Assistants was working with other AVMA entities on the Essentials of an Acceptable Program for Training Animal Technicians. The first aim of these essentials was "To aid in establishing college associate degree programs providing basic training for animal technicians.

The big step came in April 1972 when the COE, after discussion with the advisory Committee on Animal Technicians and representatives of the American Association of Laboratory Animal Science, recommended that the AVMA take immediate steps to implement a program to accredit animal technician educational programs. Later that year, the AVMA House of Delegates authorized that recommendation, creating the Committee on Accreditation of Training for Animal Technicians. The committee was to report to the COE.

The first CATAT meeting was held in Denver on Sept. 22, 1972, during which the committee adopted a list of procedures and began work on guidelines for interpretation of the essentials. In 1977, the committee was recognized by the U.S. Office of Education as the accrediting body for programs training animal technicians.

Today, CATAT is known as the Committee on Veterinary Technician Education and Activities. As of August 2012, it accredited more than 200 programs, with new programs being added every year.

EDUCATIONAL COMMISSION FOR FOREIGN VETERINARY GRADUATES

Graduates of foreign veterinary schools have been arriving in the U.S. and Canada since the countries' beginnings. It is impossible to have a discussion about veterinary education in America without mentioning names such as Dr. Andrew Smith, who established the Ontario Veterinary College, or Dr. Duncan McEachran, founder of the Montreal Veterinary College. Both graduates of the Royal (Dick) Veterinary School in Edinburgh, Scotland, they were joined in the New World by fellow alumnus Dr. James Law, founder of the veterinary department at Cornell University and an early advocate of comparative medicine and the role of veterinarians in public health.

And we cannot forget Dr. Alexandre Liautard, graduate of the veterinary college in Alfort, France, who established the American Veterinary College. A founding father and strong supporter of the USVMA, he is attributed with holding the Association together during the tenuous early years.

But those were the early days before practice acts and state boards, before the need to regulate and certify. Through the 1950s and 1960s, the Council on Education's Committee on Education in Other Countries maintained a list of recognized foreign veterinary colleges outside the U.S. and Canada. This committee also worked with the Educational Commission for Foreign Veterinary Graduates to discuss and formulate examinations of foreign veterinarians.

In July 1971, the AVMA House of Delegates approved a Procedure for Recognizing Graduates of Colleges of Veterinary Medicine outside the United States and Canada, to be overseen by the ECFVG, which would report to the COE.

In the minutes of the ECFVG's first recorded meeting in November 1971, the chair mentions the activities of the commission since its establishment in 1965 that led to the adoption of the procedures for recognizing foreign graduates.

Today, the ECFVG continues to report to the COE. Since the inception of the current certification program in January 1973, through December 2010, the ECFVG has awarded more than 4,989 certificates.

AMERICAN BOARD OF VETERINARY SPECIALTIES

The American Board of Veterinary Specialties got its formal start in 1950 when a group of American veterinary pathologists petitioned the AVMA for recognition and sponsorship of an American College of Veterinary Pathologists. This was at the same time that another group of public health veterinarians was preparing to form a similar specialty group.

On further study, the Council on Education recommended that the AVMA recognize these specialty groups after it was clear they had been organized on a sound basis. The council also requested approval to form a Committee on Specialty Boards in Veterinary Medicine.

In 1951, the American College of Veterinary Pathologists and the American Board of Veterinary Public Health (to become the American College of Veterinary Preventive Medicine in 1978) were granted AVMA recognition. The American College of Laboratory Animal Medicine followed in 1957.

Interest in veterinary specialty medicine was growing, and in 1959, at the urging of the COE, the AVMA established the Advisory Board on Veterinary Specialties. Among its responsibilities, the advisory board was to study applications for recognition from new specialty groups.

In the next 10 years, four more specialty groups gained recognition: the American College of Veterinary Radiology in 1962, American College of Veterinary Microbiologists in 1966, American College of Veterinary Surgeons in 1967, and American Board of Veterinary Toxicology in 1967.

Today, 22 Recognized Veterinary Specialty Organizations compose what is now called the American Board of Veterinary Specialties. The ABVS continues to review petitions for recognition and make recommendations to the COE.
Chapter 7  
AVMA IN ACTION

President John F. Kennedy signs a proclamation in 1963 declaring the week of the AVMA's centennial meeting to be "Veterinary Medicine Week."

Several veterinarians have been elected to Congress, including Drs. John Ensign, John Melcher, and Wayne Allard—all of whom served in the Senate—and Kurt Schrader, Oregon's 5th District representative in the House of Representatives.

Left: Former AVMA President Roger Mahr [right] uses a chance encounter with Iowa Sen. Tom Harkin on Capitol Hill to advocate on behalf of the veterinary profession.

Right: Dr. Vern Otte [foreground] discusses AVMA's legislative agenda with his elected representative and fellow Kansan Rep. Kevin Yoder.

R. Scott Nolen and Katie Burns

For 150 years, the American Veterinary Medical Association has worked to improve animal and human health and to advance the veterinary profession. As of 2012, the AVMA represented the interests of more than 84,000 veterinarians working in private and corporate practice, government, industry, academia, and uniformed services. Equally important to the AVMA mission are promoting animal health and welfare, supporting innovation in the art of science of veterinary medicine, and safeguarding the public health. As the voice of the profession, the AVMA draws on veterinary expertise to shape policies and attitudes for the betterment of animals and society. Following are a few highlights of the AVMA's advocacy since the Association's creation in 1863.

PUBLIC POLICY

Shortly after its inception, the United States Veterinary Medical Association sought to shape public policy both for the betterment of animal and public health and to elevate the status of veterinary practitioners serving in the armed forces. The first recorded instance of the Association lobbying the government occurred in 1868, just five years after the USVMA was founded. The occasion was prompted by the congressional appointment of Alexander Dunbar as a clinical lecturer to Army veterinary surgeons and farriers. The USVMA passed a resolution formally protesting the decision granting the Canadian farmer veterinary status on the grounds that Dunbar's preferred method of treating lameness in horses was an "obsolete idea" and "evidence of ignorance and barbarity." Although the USVMA was unsuccessful in having Dunbar removed from his post, the young organization would continue to speak out regarding matters of importance to organized veterinary medicine.

An essential function of the American Veterinary Review, first published in 1877, was to encourage the passage of laws preventing or controlling the spread of animal diseases, creating a National Veterinary Sanitary Commission, and regulating the practice of veterinary medicine. During the 1870s and 1880s, the USVMA petitioned Congress several times. In 1877, for example, the Association asked Washington to enact more stringent laws on foreign cattle imports to better prevent diseases from entering the country. Later, the USVMA successfully petitioned Congress to pass a law providing that any veterinarian assigned to a cavalry unit be a graduate of a veterinary college. And in 1916, the Association was instrumental in bringing about legislation that promoted Army veterinarians to the rank of a commissioned officer. The AVMA stepped up its political advocacy in 1953 with the opening of its Governmental Relations Division in the nation's capital. Retired Brig. Gen. J.A. McCallam served as the first AVMA staff representative in Washington, D.C. He was succeeded in 1965 by Dr. Frank A. Todd, who remained in the position until his retirement in 1976.

Adrian Hochstandt speaks to Northern Illinois University College of Law School students about AVMA's position on the legal relationship between pets and owners as well as other aspects of animal law.

One of the more notable initiatives overseen by the AVMA Washington office was the passage of the Veterinary Medical Education Act of 1966—the fruits of a 10-year effort by organized veterinary medicine to obtain federal support for advancements in veterinary education. President Lyndon Johnson signed the bill into law on Nov. 2, 1966. The measure extended provisions of the Health Professions Educational Assistance Act of 1963 to veterinary medicine, thereby providing federal assistance for the construction and renovation of veterinary colleges and authorizing a federal student loan fund. The AVMA and Association of American Veterinary Medical Colleges were instrumental in ensuring that veterinary medical education was included in the Comprehensive Health Manpower Training Act of 1971. Under the new law, veterinary students could apply for special student loans and scholarships, while veterinary colleges were eligible for construction grants available specifically to the health professions. One of the more bitter legislative defeats for the AVMA was President Gerald Ford's veto of the Animal Health Research Act of 1974. The AVMA-backed bill was introduced by Rep. John Melcher of Montana—a veterinarian who would later win a Senate seat—and would have appropriated $47 million for veterinary research and related activities. Yet, five days into his administration, President Ford vetoed the bill as an anti-inflationary measure.

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Although relatively small compared with other health care professions, veterinary medicine is a giant when it comes to public respect.

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Noted animal scientist Temple Grandin is one of many experts who help craft AVMA animal welfare positions.

Over the years the staff, programs, and priorities of the AVMA Governmental Relations Division have expanded to meet the evolving demands on veterinary medicine. Today, the Association's Washington office consists of several staffers with responsibilities ranging from educating members of Congress about legislation affecting veterinary medicine to mobilizing veterinarians across the country as political advocates for the profession. They host members of the AVMA Executive Board, House of Delegates, and Student AVMA during educational visits to learn about the legislative process. These trips culminate in a trip to Capitol Hill where the veterinarians and students lobby their elected representatives on behalf of the AVMA.

Although relatively small compared with other health care professions, veterinary medicine is a giant when it comes to public respect. Combining this good will with expert scientific data, the AVMA has amassed an enviable record of legislative victories over the years. The following is a sample of laws the Association has shepherded through Congress: the Animal Medicinal Drug Use Clarification Act, which allows veterinarians to use drugs in an extralabel manner; the National Veterinary Medical Service Act, which created a student loan repayment program for veterinarians working in veterinary shortage areas; the Pets Evacuation and Transportation Standards Act, which requires government emergency response plans to account for pets and service animals; a provision in the Defense Reauthorization Act mandating that the chief of the U.S. Army Veterinary Corps hold the rank of brigadier general at a minimum; and the Minor Use and Minor Species Animal Health Act, which increases the number of approved animal drugs for species and ailments with limited treatment options. Moreover, the AVMA works to secure sufficient federal appropriations for animal health-related activities within the Department of Agriculture, Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, U.S. Fish & Wildlife Service, and a host of other government initiatives particular to veterinary medicine.

Another mechanism for the AVMA to advance the veterinary profession's prominence and influence in the federal government is the Association's Congressional Science Fellowship Program. Working in conjunction with the American Association for the Advancement of Science Fellowship Program, the AVMA selects up to three veterinarians to spend one year as scientific advisers to Congress or a federal agency. On several occasions, AVMA representatives have testified before Congress as expert witnesses about a bill's merits or shortcomings.

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It's time to get our heads out of the sand.

—Former AVMA President Bonnie Beaver,  
challenging Association leaders to become more proactive in animal welfare

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Recently, AVMA leadership saw a need for the Association's advocacy to reach beyond the federal level to the state legislatures and courthouses. In 2004, the AVMA established the State Legislative and Regulatory Affairs Department in the Communications Division to support state veterinary medical associations in managing the legal issues facing them. This includes updating veterinarians about relevant legislative and regulatory developments in their state and educating state officials about AVMA policies on such topics as practices that fall within the scope of veterinary medicine, and humane livestock production. The Association also has developed a Model Veterinary Practice Act as a set of guiding principles for those preparing to revise a practice act under the codes and laws of any individual state. Increasing efforts to revise animal jurisprudence have prompted the AVMA to petition courts to preserve precedents regarding the legal status of animals and the recovery of monetary damages in litigation involving animals. State Legislative and Regulatory Affairs staff hold seminars at law schools around the country on trends in animal jurisprudence and the reasons behind the AVMA response to those trends.

ANIMAL WELFARE

Animals touch nearly every facet of our lives. They feed the world and make medical discoveries possible. They are our companions and helpers. They inspire and motivate us to act with compassion. For these reasons, the AVMA has long striven to educate society about how to treat animals humanely and with the dignity they deserve—no easy task, given the abundance of opinions and passions about animals' role in society and what constitutes good animal welfare.

The AVMA considers an animal to be in a good state of welfare if it is healthy, comfortable, well-nourished, safe, able to express innate behavior, and not experiencing pain, fear, or distress. Ensuring animal welfare includes consideration for all aspects of animal well-being, including proper housing, management, nutrition, disease prevention and treatment, responsible care, humane handling, and, when necessary, euthanasia.

The AVMA defines its commitment to animal welfare through the following Animal Welfare Principles, which serve as a guide when the Association develops policies and takes action providing for the humane treatment of animals:

• The responsible use of animals for human purposes, such as companionship, food, fiber, recreation, work, education, exhibition, and research conducted for the benefit of both humans and animals, is consistent with the Veterinarian's Oath.

• Decisions regarding animal care, use, and welfare shall be made by balancing scientific knowledge and professional judgment with consideration of ethical and societal values.

• Animals must be provided water, food, proper handling, health care, and an environment appropriate to their care and use, with thoughtful consideration for their species-typical biology and behavior.

• Animals should be cared for in ways that minimize fear, pain, stress, and suffering.

• Procedures related to animal housing, management, care, and use should be continuously evaluated, and when indicated, refined or replaced.

• Conservation and management of animal populations should be humane, socially responsible, and scientifically prudent.

• Animals shall be treated with respect and dignity throughout their lives and, when necessary, provided a humane death.

• The veterinary profession shall continually strive to improve animal health and welfare through scientific research, education, collaboration, advocacy, and the development of legislation and regulations.

The AVMA's commitment to animal welfare was not always so well-defined or visible. Because veterinarians have been so heavily involved in animal welfare since the beginning of their profession, the Association did not afford the topic any special prominence for much of its existence. This attitude changed as a result of developments in the areas of science and philosophy during the 1970s. Advances in animal welfare research, an emerging interest in the study of behavioral aspects of welfare, and a new ethic regarding the relationship between people and animals prompted the Association to become more professionally and publicly engaged in the issue of animal welfare.

Until the late 1970s, veterinarians and the AVMA were considered authorities on the acceptable uses and treatment of animals. However, activists inside and outside the veterinary profession began challenging the notion that veterinarians alone could speak about animal welfare as they pressed for reforms in the treatment of animals by the research and agricultural industries. This dissent would evolve into ever-increasing public criticism of the AVMA for a lack of engagement in these issues, along with a rise in organizations advocating for animal rights and a more humane animal-use ethic. In 1981, at the recommendation of an ad hoc committee established to study the matter, the AVMA Executive Board created the Animal Welfare Committee. Originally, the eight-member committee was tasked with spending the next two years reviewing and cataloguing publications on "animal rights, factory farming, and the use of live animals in research and industry." Committee members were directed to attend national animal welfare meetings as well as identify and develop position papers on areas where the AVMA might choose to get involved.

What started as a modest endeavor has, today, become a central tenet of the AVMA mission. As one of five core competencies identified in the AVMA Strategic Plan, advocacy for the humane treatment of animals is a principal consideration in all Association initiatives and goals. Additionally, the number of Animal Welfare Committee members has more than tripled over the three decades to constitute a diverse array of representatives from across the veterinary profession. The committee has helped create an extensive catalog of publicly available AVMA policies providing expert guidance on the humane treatment of pets, wildlife, and animals used for food, research, assistance, and entertainment. Additionally, the Animal Welfare Committee is responsible for updating the AVMA Guidelines on Euthanasia when new data become available during the 10-year interim between the panel's mandatory review period. Previous editions have not dealt with humane slaughter or methods of humane depopulation, but the AVMA is expected to address both topics in separate guidance documents.

At the request of 2004-2005 AVMA President Bonnie V. Beaver, the Executive Board approved the formation of the AVMA Animal Welfare Division for the purpose of monitoring animal welfare science and assisting the AVMA in proactively addressing issues of animal well-being. The new division was a centerpiece of Dr. Beaver's agenda as AVMA president. She spoke about its importance in 2004 during her address to the AVMA House of Delegates, saying the public and animal industries expect veterinarians to be the leaders in animal welfare—a role the AVMA had tended to resist. "It's time to get our heads out of the sand," Dr. Beaver declared. Dr. Lyle P. Vogel, previous director of the AVMA Scientific Activities Division, was chosen to head the new division, with Dr. Gail C. Golab appointed associate director. Dr. Golab has overseen the Animal Welfare Division since Dr. Vogel's retirement in 2007.

The AVMA's commitment to animal welfare is also evidenced in its impaneling of task forces of experts to provide veterinarians and industry with scientific assessments on the welfare impacts of sow housing systems and the practice of induced molting in hens. In addition, the Association hosts national symposia on such topics as pain management in animals; the humane treatment of beef cattle, zoo animals, and cats; and animal welfare in veterinary education and research. Politically, the Association has taken a stand on legislative measures that would impact the increasing number of neglected and unwanted horses in the United States and the private ownership of potentially dangerous wildlife. The AVMA works with a diverse array of stakeholders irrespective of ideology for the greater good of passing legislation benefiting animals, as was the case with the Pets Evacuation and Transportation Standards Act, the bill President George W. Bush signed into law in October 2006.

Notably, the AVMA Executive Board revised the Veterinarian's Oath in 2010 as a means of emphasizing veterinarians' commitment to animal welfare. The amended section of the oath follows, with the additions in italics: "Being admitted to the profession of veterinary medicine, I solemnly swear to use my scientific knowledge and skills for the benefit of society through the protection of animal health and welfare, the prevention and relief of animal suffering, the conservation of animal resources, the promotion of public health, and the advancement of medical knowledge."

AVMA animal welfare policy is not inflexible but dynamic and responsive to new scientific discoveries. In light of such developments, the Association now encourages the use of analgesics when dehorning and castrating calves; supports the adoption of innovations in housing systems for veal calves, pregnant sows, and egg-laying hens; and advises against cosmetic ear cropping and tail docking of dogs.

Currently, the AVMA is leading a collaborative effort to develop a model animal welfare curriculum for U.S. veterinary schools and colleges. Although not completely absent from veterinary curricula, instruction in animal welfare science and ethics is seen as insufficient, unsystematic, and disconnected in delivery. In response, the AVMA created the Model Animal Welfare Curriculum Planning Group in 2011 with the goal of helping veterinary students receive the education necessary to be leaders in the field of animal welfare as graduate veterinarians.

ANIMAL HEALTH

The basic aim of veterinary medicine is to improve the health of animals. Over the years, the AVMA has sought to enhance animal health largely through sharing of information.

According to the Association's first constitution and bylaws in 1863: "The purposes and objects of the Association are to contribute to the diffusion of the true science and particularly the knowledge of Veterinary Medicine and Surgery."

The Association established the Library Committee, Committee on Intelligence and Education, Committee on Diseases, and Finance Committee in 1864. Of these committees, all but the last had to do with diffusion of knowledge.

The Association's meetings provided a forum for committees and individual veterinarians to share information about animal health—and for the Association's leaders to adopt resolutions with recommendations regarding animal health. Soon, the Association established a journal to publish scientific findings year-round.

The 50th anniversary meeting of the AVMA in 1913 featured reports from the Committee on Diseases on forage poisoning in horses, paratuberculosis in cattle, and tuberculosis testing in cattle and hogs. Another committee described its work against advertisements for fraudulent remedies, while another presented a summary of methods for diagnosing glanders in horses. Among other actions, the AVMA adopted resolutions endorsing recommendations for the prevention of hog cholera and supporting efforts to eradicate tick fever in cattle.

By the time the AVMA neared its 100th anniversary in the early 1960s, various councils and committees had succeeded the Committee on Diseases in gathering information about diseases and other issues in animal health. At the annual convention in 1962, the actions of the House of Delegates directly relevant to animal health included the creation of a mastitis committee and the adoption of a resolution supporting efforts to eradicate brucellosis in swine.

At the 150-year mark, the mission of the AVMA is "to improve animal and human health and advance the veterinary medical profession." The Association continues seeking to enhance animal health through diffusion of knowledge via an annual convention, two journals, and other endeavors.

The Executive Board and House of Delegates adopt many policy statements—most originating from councils, committees, and other entities—that offer informed opinions about animal health. In 2011, for example, the board approved the new AVMA Guidelines for Responsible Pet Ownership.

The Association's staff members develop informational resources on animal health for the profession and the public. Among these resources are brochures for pet owners, in English and Spanish, that explain health conditions in cats and dogs. The AVMA is reaching out increasingly to veterinarians and animal owners with electronic resources on animal health—such as Web content, email newsletters, and audio and video recordings. The Association also conducts market research, including research on pet demographics, that touches on use of veterinary services.

Political advocacy by the AVMA often relates directly to animal health. The Association has been opposing federal legislation that would restrict use of antimicrobials in food animals, arguing that such restrictions could lead to an increase in disease without any assurances of an accompanying decrease in the prevalence of antimicrobial resistance. The AVMA also created a steering committee to provide input to the Food and Drug Administration on the subject of veterinary oversight of antimicrobials.

In recent years, the Association has joined with other organizations on initiatives to promote the health of cats and dogs. The AVMA is a participant in the CATalyst Council, a coalition working to advance feline health and welfare. The Association is a leader of the Partnership for Preventive Pet Healthcare, which was formed to increase feline and canine veterinary visits for regular preventive care.

The AVMA 20/20 Vision Commission proposed that the AVMA should establish a national agenda by the year 2020 that would "enable veterinarians to make major improvements for the health of more animals (including companion animals, wildlife, food animals) and humans (through promoting public health, food safety, global health, human-animal bond)." The commission also proposed that the Association should take the lead in providing expertise and promoting collaboration at a global level to improve animal and public health.

The 1913 meeting of the AVMA featured reports from the Committee on Diseases regarding a number of issues in animal health.

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RESEARCH

As chemistry and physics have advanced from alchemy, and astronomy from astrology, so has veterinary medicine progressed from empiricism and become scientific.

—Dr. John R. Mohler,  
1912-1913 AVMA President

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The AVMA developed this poster to educate pet owners about the messages of the AVMA Guidelines for Responsible Pet Ownership.

ANIMAL HEALTH RESEARCH

In 1897, upon becoming president of the Association, Dr. Daniel E. Salmon remarked that the work of the Association "must be principally of an educational nature. It should begin with its own members, encourage them to study, to think and to write. It should particularly encourage original observation and investigation."

Research on animal health has always been a priority for the AVMA. The AVMA has fostered research by sharing findings at its annual conventions, publishing findings in its two journals, providing and advocating for research funding, and offering informed opinions on needs in animal health research.

Even at the earliest meetings of the Association in the 1860s, members presented a variety of papers about findings in animal health. The first issue of the Association's American Veterinary Review in 1877 consisted of a collection of papers from the 1876 annual meeting. The Review, now the Journal of the American Veterinary Medical Association, went on to publish a wide variety of reports with findings on animal health.

At the time of the Association's 50th anniversary in 1913, the constitution and bylaws stated that one object of the AVMA was "to cultivate medical science and literature." Dr. John R. Mohler, then president, reflected on five decades of progress in the knowledge of animal diseases. He said, "As chemistry and physics have advanced from alchemy, and astronomy from astrology, so has veterinary medicine progressed from empiricism and become scientific."

In 1940, the Association created the American Journal of Veterinary Research to publish the overflow of manuscripts from the JAVMA. The AJVR grew from a quarterly publication in 1940 to a bimonthly publication in 1959 to a monthly publication in 1968. The AJVR focuses on reports that bridge basic and clinical research, while the JAVMA focuses on manuscripts with immediate clinical or practical value.

In 1941, the AVMA established the Council on Research. A primary initial project of the council was raising and awarding funds for research fellowships. In 1963, the fellowship program became the basis for formation of the AVMA Foundation, now the American Veterinary Medical Foundation.

The Foundation later discontinued the fellowship program because of competition from federal agencies, but it began to provide scholarships for veterinary students and funds for research projects. A more recent additional focus has been funding for disaster preparedness and response activities.

Entering the 21st century, the research council continued to promote veterinary research. On recommendations from the council, the Executive Board gave approval for the AVMA to provide funds toward two major National Academies studies: "National Need and Priorities for Veterinarians in Biomedical Research," which came out in 2004, and "Critical Needs for Research in Veterinary Science," which was released in 2005.

In 2007, the research council proposed the concept of the Institute for Companion Animal and Equine Research. The AVMF recently has been collaborating with other organizations to develop the Animal Health Network as an effort to embody this institute to fund research on feline, canine, and equine health.

The AVMA added a goal to the 2012-2015 strategic plan to "advance scientific research and discovery." The accompanying goal statement is for the Association to support "promotion and appropriate funding of veterinary scientific research and discovery to ensure the advancement of veterinary medical knowledge." Among the subsidiary objectives is advocating for research to support evidence-based veterinary medicine.

PANEL ON EUTHANASIA

Many have said that the AVMA Guidelines on Euthanasia are the gold standard for acceptable procedures and agents for euthanizing a spectrum of animal species. Each of the eight editions to date has summarized contemporary scientific knowledge to provide workable guidelines for veterinarians on methods for inducing death in animals as painlessly and quickly as possible when euthanasia is necessary.

The euthanasia guidelines date back to the 1960s. The Council on Research appointed five veterinarians in 1961 to serve as a Panel on Euthanasia, directing them to study methods of euthanasia for unwanted or fatally diseased small animals. Panel members approached the task by drawing on their own training, reviewing the literature, and visiting animal shelters. The 1963 document, then known as the Report of the AVMA Panel on Euthanasia, was nine pages long and comprised sections on more than a dozen euthanasia methods, with each section describing the method of euthanasia and most sections listing advantages and disadvantages as well as recommendations. The panel concluded that the best method of euthanasia for individual animals was intravenous administration of barbiturates.

In 1969, at the request of the research council, the Executive Board appointed a seven-veterinarian Euthanasia Review Panel to update the work of the first panel. Panel members considered euthanasia not only of cats and dogs but also of "birds, rodents, and other small species" and large animals. The 1972 panel report follows almost the same format as the first report, with the addition of a discussion of behavioral considerations and a table on the efficacy of four inhalation anesthetics for euthanasia.

The Executive Board appointed a euthanasia review panel in 1977 consisting of six veterinarians and one public representative. For the 1978 report, the panel added a table on mode of action of euthanasia agents and expanded the table on efficacy of inhalation anesthetics for euthanasia. The report also offered examples of recordings of physiologic activity of dogs undergoing euthanasia by various methods.

The fourth euthanasia panel, again with six veterinarians and a public representative, convened in 1984. In the 1986 report, the panel expanded the information on euthanasia of laboratory animals and food animals. The report retained the table on mode of action of euthanasia agents and provided an extensive table on characteristics of agents and methods of euthanasia. According to the postface, the panel report "calls attention to the lack of scientific reports assessing pain and discomfort in animals undergoing euthanasia."

The fifth euthanasia panel convened in 1992 with seven veterinarians. The 1993 report had tables summarizing agents and methods of euthanasia by species, acceptable agents and methods of euthanasia, conditionally acceptable agents and methods, and some unacceptable agents and methods. One section covered special considerations for horses, food animals, "nonconventional" species such as zoo animals and wildlife, and animals in fur production. In an acknowledgement, the panel stated that 130 individuals and organizations provided input for the report.

The sixth euthanasia panel convened in 1999 with 15 veterinarians and two nonveterinarians representing a variety of groups. The 2000 panel report, appearing in the JAVMA in 2001, provided more information about euthanasia of free-ranging wildlife and information about adjunctive methods of euthanasia. The report had grown longer with each edition, and the sixth edition reached 28 pages.

At a meeting in 2006, the Executive Board approved a recommendation that the AVMA convene a panel at least once per decade to produce the AVMA Guidelines on Euthanasia. In interim years, the Animal Welfare Committee would handle requests for inclusion of new euthanasia procedures or agents. At the same meeting, the board, on recommendation of the committee, approved the first interim revision—addition of maceration as a method of euthanasia for chicks, poults, and pipped eggs. The AVMA posted the euthanasia guidelines, with the revision, on its website in 2007.

In 2009, the AVMA formed 11 working groups to begin a broad-based update of the euthanasia guidelines. The groups consisted of more than 70 representatives from fields such as veterinary medicine, animal science, animal control, and animal agriculture. The panel solicited input from AVMA members on draft guidelines, eliciting several hundred comments. The new AVMA Guidelines on Euthanasia are about three times the length of the 2007 guidelines. They cover vertebrate and invertebrate species. The report does not cover slaughter and depopulation, which are to become the subjects of separate guidance documents.

AVMA Veterinary Medical Assistance Teams

AVMA VETERINARY MEDICAL ASSISTANCE TEAMS

When Hurricane Andrew hit Florida in August 1992, it became painfully apparent that people are not the only victims when disaster strikes. The category 5 hurricane devastated the state's veterinary infrastructure and left thousands of animals either dead or homeless. It was then that the AVMA began the work of organizing volunteer veterinary professionals into regional teams that could deploy to disaster areas to help animal victims.

The AVMA Veterinary Medical Assistance Teams were officially established in May 1993 by a memorandum of understanding between the AVMA and Office of Emergency Preparedness of the U.S. Public Health Service. The agreement incorporated veterinary services into the federal government's national disaster response plan. The VMATs were a private-public partnership fashioned after the medical teams deployed to disaster sites in support of human casualties of catastrophic disasters that overwhelm state and local resources. In August 1994, the AVMA and the Department of Agriculture's Animal and Plant Health Inspection Service signed an agreement authorizing the VMATs to assist the USDA during animal disease outbreaks. Then in January 1998, the AVMA and American Veterinary Medical Foundation signed a statement of understanding with the American Red Cross in which that organization recognized the AVMA and AVMF as the only national organizations representing the entire U.S. profession of licensed veterinarians.

Ultimately, four VMAT teams were developed, based in Minnesota, Massachusetts, Maryland, and North Carolina. Each team consisted of approximately 22 members from public and private veterinary practice with a broad range of skills—including wildlife, exotic, and aquatic medicine expertise as well as expertise in toxicology, pathology, surgery, and emergency and critical care. Veterinary technicians, academicians, and epidemiologists were part of each VMAT. Team members were trained in hazardous materials handling, animal triage, restraint, and transport as well as disease diagnostics and humane euthanasia. VMATs deployed during federally declared disasters at the request of local and state officials, once it was determined that veterinary assistance was needed. The job of the teams was to assist the local veterinary community with caring for animals and providing veterinary oversight and advice. A member of the AVMA Scientific Activities Division continues to coordinate the Association's emergency preparedness and response activities, including the VMAT program.

The mission of the VMATs has evolved over the years. The program is now a private endeavor of the AVMA and AVMF focusing on providing early assessments of animal-related needs during disasters, offering basic treatment of affected animals, and training state and local responders to provide animal-related disaster relief when called on. But in their early years, the VMATs deployed often. On 9/11, 51 individuals, including members of all four VMATs, deployed to the World Trade Center in New York City, the site of the terrorist attack that killed nearly 3,000 people. There, they supported the efforts of local veterinary responders to provide medical care for the search-and-rescue dogs that were used to scour the rubble for survivors. From Sept. 11 until Oct. 31, the VMATs provided more than 900 treatments to some 300 SAR dogs at the disaster site.

The AVMA Veterinary Medical Assistance Teams assisted with veterinary care during the response to Hurricane Katrina (left) and 9/11 (right).

Four years later, when Hurricane Katrina devastated the Gulf Coast region, the federal government for the first time deployed all four VMATs, with two teams deploying to Louisiana and the other two to Mississippi. The teams provided medical care for injured animals, including SAR dogs; coordinated animal relief efforts on-site; assessed the local veterinary infrastructure; and addressed public health issues. Additionally, the AVMA pledged $500,000 to match donations to a new fund created by the AVMF to provide relief for animals and veterinarians affected by the hurricane. The Foundation continues to offer disaster-related grants, with funding available to cover the costs of training, reimbursement for supplies, and repairs for veterinary practices damaged during a disaster.

Hurricane Katrina made it clear that many animal owners would not be willing to evacuate from a disaster area without their pets, prompting Congress to pass the Pets Evacuation and Transportation Standards Act of 2006. The AVMA supported the legislation, which granted the Federal Emergency Management Agency authority to help state and local governments develop emergency and evacuation plans that take pets and service animals into account. The AVMA's commitment to ensuring the safety of every family member is evident by the Association's many initiatives in this area. For example, the Executive Board established the Committee on Disaster and Emergency Issues in 2001 to, among other things, advise the AVMA on the veterinary profession's role in emergency and disaster issues. The AVMA has created brochures and a Web page with instructions on ways of incorporating animals into emergency response plans.

PUBLIC HEALTH

Whether it's testing for dangerous concentrations of Escherichia coli and Salmonella at a processing plant, vaccinating pets against rabies, or monitoring wild birds for the deadly avian influenza virus, veterinary medicine has always been a public health profession. Leaders of the nascent USVMA had a clear understanding about the relationship of veterinary medicine to human health and encouraged the inclusion of veterinarians on municipal sanitation boards. Butchers and policemen were more likely than veterinarians to be meat inspectors, which provoked Dr. Alexandre F. Liautard in 1879 to write in the American Veterinary Review: "Especially needed are veterinarians as meat inspectors, for no other can be so well fitted to detect the presence of disease in an animal intended for slaughter, or evidence of its previous existence in the meat that is offered for sale."

A handful of boards of health, notably in New York City's borough of Brooklyn and the state of New Jersey, recognized early on the connection between human and veterinary medicine, and, since the early 1880s, counted veterinarians as members. Henry Bergh, founder of the American Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals, called on government to take advantage of the skills and knowledge of veterinarians to combat animal diseases—particularly rabies, glanders, trichinosis, and tuberculosis—to the benefit of the public. "Not only is the skill of the veterinary practitioner applicable to diseases and accidents of domestic animals, but his learning and experience should be employed by the state in a sanitary point of view." By the close of 1885, the number of state veterinarians had grown to 15.

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Butchers and policemen were more likely than veterinarians to be meat inspectors.

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Today, Bergh's vision has been realized, as the number of state veterinarians has grown to 50. Moreover, with thousands of veterinarians working for the USDA, CDC, and Department of Defense, among others, the federal government is one of the largest employers of veterinarians. The veterinarian's role as a protector of public health has often gone unnoticed, however. Dr. W.H. Lowe, speaking before the AVMA in 1900, said, "People recognize and appreciate much quicker and in a fuller sense what veterinary medicine does for their pet animals and for themselves, in a commercial sense, in protecting the animal wealth than they do for what the science does for the health and lives of the people themselves."

Despite this lack of recognition, the AVMA's commitment to promoting human health and well-being through the profession has never flagged. Helping direct the Association's efforts in this important area is the Council on Public Health and Regulatory Veterinary Medicine. Working with the Food Safety Advisory Committee, this council recommends AVMA support for programs designed to prevent, control, and eradicate animal diseases, and it studies problems associated with zoonoses and ensuring a safe and adequate food supply of animal origin. Each May, the AVMA hosts National Dog Bite Prevention Week to help reduce the nearly 5 million dog bites that happen every year. Additionally, the AVMA advocates for legislation expanding the number of veterinarians working in public health–related areas of practice and sufficient funding for food safety and biomedical research programs.

Through many policies, scientific backgrounders, and online resources, including podcasts and KeepOurFoodSafe.org, the AVMA offers the public and policymakers timely information about various animal-related threats to human health, such as bovine spongiform encephalopathy, zoonotic pathogens potentially used as biological weapons, plague, and West Nile virus. The AVMA also promotes human health and well-being by championing the special relationship between people and pets known as the human-animal bond. Veterinarians strive to maximize the potential benefits of the bond to both the animal and owner. Grief over a pet's death can be as profound as the loss of a friend or family member. To help these pet owners, the Association has promulgated guidelines for providing support to people coping with the loss of a companion animal.

ONE HEALTH

Closely associated with veterinary medicine's public health role is the concept that human, animal, and ecosystem wellness are interconnected and dependent on one other. Luminaries within the medical community have understood this relationship for centuries. Hippocrates, the father of Western medicine, instructed physicians to consider how seasons, weather, and environment might impact a patient's health. Calls for a holistic approach to medicine have been voiced by the likes of Giovanni Lancisi, Louis-Rene Villerme, Rudolf Virchow, William Osler, Louis Pasteur, Robert Koch, Rachel Carson, and James Steele. In his book "Veterinary Medicine and Human Health," Dr. Calvin Schwabe called it "one medicine," which has grown into the present-day one-health movement.

The recent increased interest in one health began in earnest in 2006 when AVMA President Roger K. Mahr called for the creation of a national commission uniting veterinary and human medicine for the purpose of improving and protecting animal and public health worldwide. In his address before the AVMA House of Delegates, Dr. Mahr said, "Animal health is truly at a crossroads. Its convergence with human and ecosystem health dictates that the 'one world, one health, one medicine' concept must be embraced. We need our colleagues in human medicine, public health, and the environmental health sciences. Together, we can accomplish more in improving global health than we can alone, and we have the responsibility to do so." With their training in population health and comparative and preventive medicines, veterinarians are uniquely qualified to lead the one-health charge.

Dr. Mahr's proposal ultimately led to formation of the nonprofit One Health Commission in June 2009. In addition to the AVMA, member organizations include the American Medical Association, American Public Health Association, Association of American Veterinary Medical Colleges, and Association of American Medical Colleges. The mission of the One Health Commission is "the establishment of closer professional interactions, collaborations, and educational and research opportunities across the health sciences professions, together with their related disciplines, to improve the health of people, domestic animals, wildlife, plants, and our environment."

One of the commission's first efforts was to hold the One Health Summit in Washington, D.C., to raise awareness of the importance of transcending institutional and disciplinary boundaries to improve health for all species. Currently hosted at Iowa State University, the One Health Commission is overseen by a board of directors comprising veterinarians and physicians, with Dr. Mahr serving as the chief executive officer.

The one-health concept has gained widespread acceptance in academia and government in the United States and around the world. Adoption of the one-health approach is partly a response to the fact that most emerging and re-emerging diseases are zoonotic. In 2009, the CDC established a One Health Office, now within the National Center for Emerging and Zoonotic Infectious Diseases.

AVMA AWARDS

At a meeting of the USVMA in 1875, members agreed that two prizes be given each year for the best papers on any veterinary subject. The number of accolades the Association awards has expanded along with the size of the veterinary profession and the noteworthiness of veterinarians' contributions to human and animal health. Today, with financial assistance from the AVMF, its donors, and partners, the AVMA gives out more than a dozen awards each year. The winners are esteemed members of the veterinary community and others who have dedicated themselves and their careers to a diverse range of disciplines, from agriculture, public health, humane education, animal welfare, clinical practice, and research to government activities and professional education.

The list of AVMA awards is as follows: The AVMA Award, Bustad Companion Animal Veterinarian of the Year Award, AVMA Meritorious Service Award, AVMA Advocacy Award, AVMA Animal Welfare Award, AVMA Humane Award, AVMA Lifetime Excellence in Research Award, AVMA Practitioner Research Award, AVMA President's Award, AVMA Public Service Award, AVMA XIIth International Veterinary Congress Prize, AVMF/American Kennel Club Career Achievement Award in Canine Research, and AVMF/Winn Excellence in Feline Research Award.

The AVMA Award is considered the highest honor the Association can bestow on a member. Established in 1931, The AVMA Award recognizes distinguished Association members who have contributed to the advancement of veterinary medicine in its organizational aspects. Veterinarians who have exerted outstanding leadership in building stronger local, state, or regional associations, or who have contributed to the improvement of the national organization, are eligible for the award.

Also notable is the award named for the late Dr. Leo K. Bustad, a former dean of the Washington State University College of Veterinary Medicine and a past president of the Pet Partners (formerly Delta Society). The Bustad Companion Animal Veterinarian of the Year Award honors the outstanding work of veterinarians in preserving and protecting human-animal relationships. This award is co-sponsored by the AVMA, Pet Partners, and Hill's Pet Nutrition Inc. The Bustad Award includes a $5,000 grant to the winner with a $5,000 grant to the veterinary college or not-for-profit service program of the veterinarian's choice to further work in improving human–companion animal interactions.

Established in 1931, the AVMA Award honors an Association member who has advanced veterinary medicine in its organizational aspects.
Chapter 8  
LASTING ALLIANCES

Susan C. Kahler

Partnerships, strategic alliances, and coalitions have enabled the American Veterinary Medical Association to enhance its offerings, strengthen its voice, fund valuable initiatives, and promote common goals. These liaisons have helped advance the profession's mission in areas ranging from legislative advocacy to pet wellness to veterinary continuing education. Collaborating entities have run the gamut from nonprofits to government agencies to corporations.

A few relationships have stirred controversy. In the mid-1990s, the profession became polarized over whether to continue teaming up on a common goal by endorsing the Doris Day Animal League's Spay Day USA, torn by concerns that the sponsor also advocated an end to the use of animals in production agriculture and research. Controversy also arose in 2005 over the propriety of joining forces financially with Heifer International to provide recovery aid to impoverished families in South and Central Asia after a tsunami hit the region, although few would dispute the good AVMA did in raising $1 million.

Most AVMA partnerships have been straightforward and fruitful. The four entities most closely linked to the AVMA in long-lived partnerships are the Auxiliary to the AVMA, American Veterinary Medical Foundation, AVMA Group Health & Life Insurance Trust, and AVMA PLIT. Their collaboration with the AVMA collectively spans 250 years.

AUXILIARY TO THE AVMA

The oldest of these four AVMA partners is the Auxiliary to the AVMA. In fact, the Auxiliary holds the distinction of being the first auxiliary to the healing arts established in the United States.

It was during World War I, before women had a vote, that the Women's Auxiliary to the American Veterinary Medical Association was formed at the Kansas City Veterinary College in Missouri. The date was Aug. 22, 1917.

Membership was open to wives, daughters, mothers, sisters, and widows of veterinarians. The 55 original members set annual dues at 50 cents and elected Mrs. W. Horace Hoskins of Philadelphia as their first president; 12 years later, she would be honored as the Auxiliary's "mother." Each state was to select a secretary to report to the national auxiliary.

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The women got together for food, fun, and "the swapping of ideas on how to be a good wife to a veterinarian." But some men thought the presence of women hampered their social freedom, and it was a generally held opinion that women had no place in their husband's business.

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For women who just wanted to support their husbands' profession and have fun in the process, the Auxiliary met with some stiff opposition, as told in the Auxiliary's 75th anniversary history, from which many of these highlights through 1992 are excerpted.

Even before the organization was created, some veterinarians had taken their wives to AVMA meetings. The women got together for food, fun, and "the swapping of ideas on how to be a good wife to a veterinarian." But some men thought the presence of women hampered their social freedom, and it was a generally held opinion that women had no place in their husband's business.

At the 1918 AVMA Annual Convention in Philadelphia, opposition leaders stationed themselves at the Auxiliary's meeting-room door to block entry, but supporters prevailed. In 1923 in Montreal, challengers again tried to dissolve the Auxiliary but were foiled, and Canadian women were admitted for the first time.

AN EVOLVING MISSION

Having prevailed, the Auxiliary launched into its work of supporting the veterinary profession, adapting its objectives over the years to meet the changing needs.

In 1918, the Auxiliary adopted a constitution and bylaws with the objective "... to give necessary financial assistance to the family of any veterinarian engaged in war work if his life has been forfeited in pursuance of such work, or if he has been temporarily or permanently disabled."

With the need for war relief over by the 1919 convention in New Orleans, the Auxiliary sought new ways to serve and amended its constitution to state that its object was "to give necessary financial assistance to the family of a veterinarian if he has been temporarily or permanently disabled."

The only such request ever made and filled was $50 to a family for fuel in 1921.

In 1920, the Auxiliary appointed a committee to study the suggestion of providing financial aid, in the form of loans, to veterinary students. The loan committee consulted with college deans and AVMA members. The following year, after hearing the committee's report, the Auxiliary authorized a student loan fund and amended its objective to state: "The object of the Auxiliary shall include a loan fund to be used for the assistance of needy veterinary students." That year, a student at The Ohio State University received the first loan, of $175.

Within four years, requests for student loans had increased beyond the Auxiliary's resources, so the AVMA placed $2,000 from the Salmon Memorial Fund at the disposal of the Auxiliary, which, in turn, paid the AVMA 4 percent interest on the amount used.

Demand for loans reflected the events of the day. The Stock Market Crash of 1929 drove up demand, as did the Great Depression. In 1947, demand dropped, with many returning World War II veterans receiving educational grants under the GI Bill of Rights. By 1954, the AVMA had accredited 19 colleges, driving demand back up.

To generate resources for loans, the Auxiliary at various times borrowed from the AVMA, limited the number of loans it made to students, conducted a membership drive, and established a Memorial Fund for donors to honor friends and relatives.

In 1951, AVMA President Clarence P. Zepp Sr. appealed for the Auxiliary's help with fundraising for the AVMA Research Trust, which had been created five years earlier. During 1951, the Auxiliary made only one student loan, so it was looking for other ways to serve veterinarians. As a result, the Auxiliary became more active in public relations and research fundraising.

Within 10 years, the Auxiliary achieved its goal of conducting a campaign to raise $75,000 for fellowships through the research fund.

Auxiliary officers, 1956 – 1957

Up to then, the Auxiliary had been involved in various public relations efforts. In 1945, it produced the booklet "What the Veterinary Profession Means to the Public." At the AVMA's request, in 1955 the Auxiliary set up a radio committee to sponsor a public relations program. AVMA members carried out radio, and, later, TV programs, arranged and coordinated by Auxiliary members. The new Auxiliary committee assisted constituent auxiliaries with these public relations activities. In 1975, the Auxiliary introduced its public relations guide "Is There a Veterinarian in the House?"

In 1978, the Auxiliary adopted the following pledge: "As members of the Auxiliary to the AVMA, we pledge ourselves to these goals: To assist in informing the public of the value of veterinary services. To assist selected veterinary students with loans and awards. To strengthen the bonds of friendship among those connected with the veterinary profession." The Auxiliary introduced a media kit two years later to help with public service announcements.

Besides public relations, the Auxiliary undertook many educational and fundraising projects. It began selling jewelry bearing the Auxiliary crest and released the handbook "Today's Topics for Veterinarians' Wives" in 1969. Incentive awards were presented to a graduating student and a fourth-year student's spouse at each veterinary college, and to state science fair winners. The Auxiliary sponsored various student auxiliary activities and created an honor roll for constituent auxiliaries that achieved certain benchmarks.

In 1973, the Auxiliary appointed a panel to compile a list of books that would enhance the profession, and two years later, the organization distributed its first "approved booklist" to librarians across the country.

The Auxiliary's popular Marketplace of States, an AVMA convention event featuring items offered by constituent auxiliaries, often netted thousands of dollars for the student loan fund and other educational projects. In 1976, the Auxiliary donated $10,702 for the veterinary exhibit at the Museum of Science and Industry in Chicago, and in 1991 it contributed $10,000 for partial funding of an AVMA Congressional Science Fellowship. The Auxiliary even compiled and sold cookbooks and raised money to purchase an automatic flagpole for the first headquarters building the AVMA owned in Schaumburg, Ill., in 1975.

The AVMA veterinary exhibit at Chicago's Museum of Science and Industry benefited from Auxiliary support.

SOCIAL CONVENTIONS

The Auxiliary has always teamed work with pleasure. Even in 1917, some patriotic veterinarians' wives served a luncheon before the organizational meeting, observing the wartime "wheatless Wednesdays" by serving a suitable Boston brown bread, a veal salad, and ice cream in cantaloupe halves. At the 1918 AVMA meeting in Philadelphia, a group of veterinarians took their wives on a side trip to Atlantic City to "jump the breakers." The women were dressed in ruffled caps, black stockings, and daring knee-length bathing suits.

Whether a moonlight cruise on the St. Lawrence or a glass-bottom boat ride along Catalina Island, an excursion to Mount Rainier or a clambake in New England, Auxiliary members found fun amid their work and encountered history along the way. In 1933, they visited the Chicago World's Fair, and in 1959, the Truman Library in Independence, Mo., where former President Harry S. Truman addressed them. Aviatrix Amelia Earhart spoke at an Auxiliary luncheon held for the wives of foreign visitors at the 1934 New York meeting.

The Women's Auxiliary celebrated its golden anniversary in 1967 in Dallas' Baker Hotel. Auxiliary board members costumed in clothes fashionable in 1917 served as hostesses. Entertainment was a look at "Hats and history" from 1896-1967. Decorating the tables were dolls dressed by constituent auxiliaries in fashions of the preceding 50 years. Charter members Lillie Grossman and Margaret Lockhart cut the anniversary cake.

DOWN TO BUSINESS

The Hall of Science at the 1933 – 1934 World's Fair in Chicago included an AVMA exhibit. The Auxiliary visited the fair.  
Courtesy of Lake County (Ill.) Discovery Museum,  
Curt Teich Postcard Archives

The Auxiliary amended its constitution and bylaws in 1924 to provide for its Executive Board, and in 1930, a movement was begun to encourage formation of state auxiliaries, laying the foundation for the Auxiliary's House of Representatives, later called House of Delegates. By the 1947 meeting, there were 25 well-organized state auxiliaries. In 1939, the Women's Auxiliary to the American Veterinary Medical Association was incorporated in Illinois, where the AVMA office in Chicago was handling the student loan fund. The articles of incorporation were amended in 1977 to change the name to the Auxiliary to the American Veterinary Medical Association.

The 1946 meeting was the first where membership cards and dues receipts were issued, marking the first time that membership was considered independently from attendance at the national convention.

Charter Auxiliary members Lillie Grossman (left) and Margaret Lockhart cut the golden anniversary cake.

Each Junior AVMA organization at a veterinary school had an auxiliary by 1948, and five of these student auxiliaries had affiliated with the AVMA Auxiliary. 1949 was a year of sweeping changes, according to the Auxiliary's 75th anniversary history, as the organization set aside its old structure and adopted a new constitution. In 1950, a Foreign Relations Committee was created to be the liaison with the Women's International Veterinary Auxiliary.

At its 1959 meeting, the Auxiliary adopted a new constitution that closely paralleled the AVMA's. Each state or provincial auxiliary was allowed a delegation of one to seven members. That fall, the Auxiliary set up its office in the AVMA headquarters in Chicago, which led to a closer relationship and exchange of ideas. The Auxiliary HOD began conducting all the organization's business in 1964. Representation was based on one delegate for every 50 members in good standing.

The Auxiliary had an office supervisor until 1968, when the title became executive secretary. AVMA staff member Lavina Davenport served in that position from 1959-1974, when the Auxiliary office was moved to Manhattan, Kan., and Maxine Caley became executive secretary. In 1992, the Auxiliary moved into rent-free space at AVMA headquarters in Schaumburg, Ill., and Chris Kanalas served as executive secretary until 1999. Temporary directors were engaged until Jan Knewtson became secretary-treasurer and took over administrative duties out of Iola, Kan., from 2004-2010.

The name of each Auxiliary president is listed on a plaque displayed at AVMA headquarters since it was presented to Executive Vice President Ron DeHaven at the 2011 AVMA convention in St. Louis.

CHALLENGING TIMES

The gender shift that eventually led to employed female veterinarians outnumbering males in 2009 was associated with a corresponding decline in Auxiliary members. In its first 40 years, the Auxiliary saw its membership increase from the original 55 charter members to 6,000. Membership peaked at more than 10,000 in 1971. But by 1990, the number had fallen to 6,460, and by 2000, it was 2,765. As of July 2012, the Auxiliary had 303 dues-paying members and 644 life members.

Ginger Morton, 2011-2012 Auxiliary president, takes a sanguine view. "There has been a strong trend of ladies joining the veterinary field, and this, too, opens doors for a new face for the Auxiliary through male spouses."

Ironically, a bright spot was the August 2012 installation of the first male president in Auxiliary history. Greg Mooney of Mount Gilead, Ohio, husband of Dr. Marty Mooney, a 1978 graduate of The Ohio State University, has been active in the AVMA and Ohio VMA auxiliaries for 34 years. He retired as a lieutenant colonel in 1997 after 20 years of active duty with the U.S. Air Force and with the Ohio Air National Guard.

Mooney thinks a combination of factors has led to the membership decline, such as spouses having careers and outside interests that compete for their time, and the passage of privacy laws that make it difficult to obtain spousal names. Morton notes that retention declined when dues were raised, when Auxiliary dues reminders were removed from spouses' AVMA member dues invoices, and when two-income households became the norm. The member decline and waiver of dues for life members have impacted Auxiliary revenue.

Another challenge was moving Auxiliary headquarters in 2010 from Kansas to AVMA headquarters in Illinois, the state of the Auxiliary's incorporation. Since then, AVMA and Auxiliary staff have overseen the administrative work. To bring the organization into full compliance with Illinois nonprofit law, delegates in 2012 voted to rescind the constitution, to allow new bylaws to be put in place.

In 2011, the Auxiliary House of Delegates authorized the organization's Executive Board to convert the student loan fund to an endowed scholarship fund distributed by the American Veterinary Medical Foundation. The memorandum of understanding remained in negotiation between the two organizations as of October 2012. Once it is finalized, the Auxiliary must obtain approval from the Illinois attorney general. The Auxiliary will continue to help raise scholarship funds and send a representative to the scholarship board.

The Auxiliary's primary focus remains National Pet Week, the Kritters Korner Gift Store, and the Marketplace of States, along with live and silent auctions as fundraisers. Auxiliary members also visit AVMA student chapters at the veterinary schools.

The Auxiliary's primary focus is (from left) the Kritters Korner Gift Store, National Pet Week, and the Marketplace of States.

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We think the purposes for which the Auxiliary was founded are good, and we hope to still find ways to do them.

—Greg Mooney,  
2012 – 2013 president,  
Auxiliary to the AVMA

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With the decline in Auxiliary membership, some have called for the organization to dissolve. A resolution outlining a plan for voluntary dissolution was submitted to the Auxiliary HOD in 2011. In August 2012, however, delegates passed a resolution from the Auxiliary board postponing indefinitely the resolution for voluntary dissolution.

Mooney said, "We want to see the Auxiliary continue. There are some questions by a few people who wonder if we can, but I don't think it ought to be based solely on economics.

"We think the purposes for which the Auxiliary was founded are good, and we hope to still find ways to do them."

Whatever the future holds, the Auxiliary has been a loyal AVMA partner, serving the profession and the public for 95 years.

AMERICAN VETERINARY MEDICAL FOUNDATION

The year 2012 found the American Veterinary Medical Foundation nearing the half-century mark, rated as a coveted four-star charity, and undertaking management of a major new companion animal research initiative, the Animal Health Network.

As chronicled by the AVMF itself, in 2011 the Foundation was there in the aftermath of the devastating tornado in Joplin, Mo., caring for traumatized pets. It was there in remote agricultural areas ensuring ongoing care for the nation's food animals. It was there supporting scientists as they uncovered new clues in the study of feline diseases. And it was there promoting the importance of preventive pet care as visits to veterinary hospitals were on the decline.

As the charitable arm of the AVMA, the AVMF is dedicated to advancing the well-being and medical care of animals. Charitable contributions and support to the Foundation help veterinarians help animals.

Michael Cathey, AVMF executive director, said, "The Foundation is the vehicle for veterinarians to take animal welfare beyond the clinic, providing them with the tools to empower them to become ambassadors for animals. We believe we are the niche that's veterinarian-directed. We need veterinarians to partner with us to reach the animal-owning public and make a difference for animals."

Providing disaster-related grants after devastating events such as the Joplin, Mo., tornado that killed 158 people is one of the American Veterinary Medical Foundation's missions.  
AP Photo / Charlie Riedel

GENESIS OF THE FOUNDATION

The story of the Foundation begins in 1963, when the AVMA first established the AVMA Foundation as a 501(c)(3) nonprofit organization. At that time, there was an AVMA Research Trust and a Student Loan Fund of the Women's Auxiliary to the AVMA. But an Executive Board committee studying possible expansion of the research trust reported that the trust's purposes were self-limiting and that expanded activity in student loans was needed as well.

In a 1972 synopsis of AVMA Foundation history, Dr. Don H. Spangler, then treasurer, explained there was general consensus on the need to create an entity that would stimulate graduate study and research in veterinary medicine; seek and maintain funds for furthering scientific, literary, and educational purposes directly associated with veterinary medicine; and possibly operate a loan program for veterinary students.

As recounted in a brief 1983 history sketch of the Foundation's early years, then AVMA Executive Vice President D.A. Price wrote: "We who were on the scene recall the contentions that fund raising would never be successful unless the Research Trust was abandoned and a foundation formed in its stead—that there are 'hundreds of thousands of dollars out there, just waiting for a foundation to ask for them.'"

The new Foundation's objectives encompassed graduate fellowships, undergraduate scholarships, the Student Loan Fund, continuing education, publications, public education, and field investigations—clinical, preclinical, and economic.

In 1965, the Foundation board of directors employed a full-time executive secretary and established an office in the AVMA headquarters in Chicago. But the following year, at the request of the Foundation directors, the AVMA Executive Board took action during the AVMA Annual Meeting that resulted in legal separation of the Foundation from the Association. In taking that action, the Executive Board gave the Foundation authority to change its own bylaws and to appoint its own board of directors.

The reason for this separation was the Foundation directors' belief that some industrial firms and other potential donors might be reluctant to contribute to a foundation controlled by a professional association. In his history sketch, Dr. Price wrote that it soon became apparent the new Foundation's overhead would be sizeable, fundraising efforts were not going to achieve the desired goals, and the "big money out there" was not going to be contributed to a foundation so closely linked to the AVMA and housed in its headquarters.

To establish an identity that was also physically separate from that of the AVMA, the Foundation moved its offices from AVMA headquarters in downtown Chicago to Park Ridge, Ill., 15 miles northwest.

In late fall 1966, the Foundation's Park Ridge office experienced a destructive fire. According to Dr. Price, things fared no better with the Foundation in a different location, anyway. All physical assets of the Foundation were moved back to AVMA headquarters in July 1967.

Volunteers with the AVMF's "Our Oath in Action" program help rehab an Atlanta animal shelter during the 2010 AVMA convention.  
Photo by Patrick Williams/PWP Studio

The Foundation was initially reorganized in 1967 and again in 1970. Subsequent bylaws changes resulted in its current governing structure. AVMA Executive Board members constitute the members of the Foundation as a corporate body. They approve any changes to the Foundation's bylaws and elect the AVMF directors, who manage the Foundation's affairs and determine its general policies in applying funds.

Up to 30 individuals—veterinarians or nonveterinarians—may be elected to serve as Foundation directors. Among them are four members of the AVMA Executive Board, the AVMA executive vice president, a representative from the Auxiliary to the AVMA, and two members of the AVMA House of Delegates.

As of August 2012, the AVMF had six full-time employees, including a financial and administrative assistant who split her time between the AVMF and Auxiliary under a memorandum of understanding.

In December 1994, the organization's name was changed from the AVMA Foundation to the American Veterinary Medical Foundation.

Military members who work with animals were honored during An AVMF Special Event on Board the USS Midway during the 2012 AVMA convention in San Diego.

Dr. Sam Strahm (left) primps Morris for his fans with handlers Bob Martwick at the 1990 AVMA convention. A longtime AVMF board member, Dr. Strahm was chair in 1998 when the American Red Cross designated the AVMA the Foundation as the leaders in coordinating animal disaster relief efforts.

IT'S ALL IN THE PROGRAMS

The AVMF relies on the generosity of animal lovers and veterinary communities for its funding, so its charity rating is important. The Foundation is supported by contributions from individuals, corporations, state and allied veterinary organizations, the Auxiliary to the AVMA, and the AVMA. The Association supports the Foundation through special contributions, a loan, office space, and limited staff support.

The AVMF also hosts fundraisers, such as the special event on board the USS Midway during the 2012 AVMA Annual Convention in San Diego. This event, which at 1,151 visitors was the best-attended in Foundation history, raised about $140,000 and showcased the AVMF to the profession as a highly respected charitable organization.

In 2011, Charity Navigator, America's largest independent charity evaluator, awarded the AVMF its highest rating: four stars. This means the Foundation exceeds industry standards and outperforms most charities with a similar cause. The AVMF was among only 22 percent of charities with a four-star rating in the category of Animal Rights, Welfare, and Services.

The Foundation's end-of-year 2011 program expenses—funds spent on initiatives that carry out the AVMF's mission—were an enviable 83 percent, with fundraising at 11 percent and management and general expenses at 6 percent.

"Programmatic impact is really what Charity Navigator looks at," Cathey said. "We've made great movement in the area of public education and awareness, and monetary impact. Our program expenses ranged from 58 percent in 2009 to 76 percent in 2010 to 83 percent in 2011."

The Foundation has worked hard to merit those stars. Only a few years ago, the AVMF was in the unenviable position of holding a one-star rating. That provided the wake-up call about staffing, strategic planning, and other areas needing attention.

Elation followed the 2011 announcement of the four-star rating. Dr. Clark K. Fobian, chair of the Foundation board of directors from 2010-2012, said in a press release at the time, "The amount of each donation that goes toward programs has skyrocketed."

In a 2010 interview with the Journal of the AVMA, Dr. Fobian attributed the former high overhead costs relative to programmatic expenses to the AVMA's past inexperience in working with the Foundation, which he said kept the charity from operating in a way that would have demonstrated its usefulness to the Association.

Since becoming AVMF executive director in 2008, Cathey has stressed the importance of directing AVMA program funds through the Foundation. In the interview, Dr. Fobian said, "This 'pass-through' strategy is used extensively by other supporting charities with tremendous advantage. In channeling financial resources through the Foundation, you have increased the highly visible program spending while incurring virtually no additional administration cost."

University of California-Davis investigators Leslie Lyons, PhD, professor of feline genetics, and Robert Grahn, PhD, project scientist, were among the initial researchers supported by the AVMF and other organizations through the Cat Health Network, the pilot project of the Animal Health Network.  
Photo by Don Preisler / UCDavis

Veterinary student Travis Vliestra, a 2012 AVMF scholarship recipient, examines sheep being treated at Iowa State University's teaching hospital. Scholarships are part of the AVMF's veterinary student enhancement initiatives.  
Photo by Tracy Ann Raef / ISU CVM

STRATEGIC GOALS IN ACTION

Over the past decade, the AVMF has awarded millions of dollars in grants. Last year, the Foundation granted $2.5 million in funding. The AVMF has five strategic goals. One is to identify ways to support the AVMA's efforts and develop programs in collaboration with the Association.

Following is a breakdown of 2011 funding according to the AVMF's four other strategic goals.

Education and Public Awareness: 45 percent. The Foundation sponsors education and awareness programs on the benefits of veterinary medicine to animal and human well-being. An example is "Our Oath in Action," a program in which veterinarians, students, and other AVMA convention attendees volunteer to paint, clean, and improve local animal shelters. Another is The Pet Memorial and Tribute Program, which provides a platform for veterinary practices to honor clients' pets.

Student Enhancement: 39 percent. The AVMF funds scholarships to veterinary students attending AVMA-accredited veterinary colleges in the United States. Pfizer Animal Health also partners with the AVMF to award student scholarships each year; in 2012, $827,500 in scholarships went to 331 veterinary students. The AVMF also selects a third- or fourth-year student with a keen interest in cats to receive a scholarship from the Winn Feline Foundation.

The Food Animal Veterinarian Recruitment and Retention Program is also under this strategic goal. This joint program of the AVMF and AVMA provides financial incentives in the form of loan repayment grants for veterinarians who commit to four years of employment in food animal medicine.

Humane Outreach and Animal Welfare: 10 percent. The Animal Disaster Relief and Response Fund was created in 2005 to help alleviate suffering caused by Hurricane Katrina. Through that fund, the Foundation supports animal disaster preparedness and response efforts through grants to organizations for training, medical supplies, and equipment. It provides reimbursement and relief for veterinarians who care for animal victims of disaster and for restoration of veterinary infrastructure affected by disaster. Recently this fund has provided relief after the Haiti earthquake, Japan earthquake and tsunami, and spring 2012 tornadoes, flooding, and wildfires.

The AVMF also provides substantial support to the AVMA Veterinary Medical Assistance Teams. VMAT volunteers serve as first responders to ensure that pets, livestock, zoo animals, and wildlife receive high-quality care during times of crisis. VMATs provide operational assistance in emergency response programs to state animal health authorities, and they organize and provide training preparedness programs to animal health authorities, veterinary associations, and other organizations.

Research Support: 6 percent. The AVMF is committed to building on progress in the area of veterinary research primarily through the Animal Health Network. This is a Foundation initiative under the direction of the AVMF Task Force on Research Support focused on fund development for companion animal and equine research. The initiative resulted from identification by the AVMA Council on Research of the need for such funding. The Cat Health Network is the first pilot project, and its sponsoring partners and others plan to launch future projects involving equine and companion animal health.

Kristine Venegoni, a registered veterinary technician and member of AVMA Veterinary Medical Assistance Team-2, takes part in a training exercise. The AVMF provides substantial support to the VMATs.

GOING FOR GOLD

As it approached its 50th anniversary year of 2013, the AVMF was advancing new initiatives under the leadership of its Foundation board chair for 2012-2014, Dr. Richard Streett Jr.

The "Go for Gold in 2013" campaign was about to be launched in November 2012 with a fundraising goal of $2.5 million and 50,000 new donors. The Foundation planned to introduce a program called America's Favorite Veterinarian in fall 2012 and to expand the "Our Oath in Action" volunteer shelter rehab from an AVMA convention-time event into a community-wide, year-round service project across the country.

The AVMF's commitment to student financial assistance will be enhanced when the Foundation assumes responsibility for distribution of a new endowed scholarship fund. The Auxiliary to the AVMA was in the process of legally converting its $2.1 million loan fund into an Endowed Legacy Scholarship Fund and transferring responsibility to the Foundation for distributing the annual interest of about $100,000.

Central to the Foundation's work will be collaboration on two existing initiatives: the Animal Health Network and the Partnership for Preventive Pet Healthcare, created in 2011 to improve the lives of the nation's pets, which includes educating pet owners on the importance of preventive care.

Dr. Streett said, "During the last 50 years, our Foundation has made an impact on the support and welfare of animals. Because of some refocus and rebuilding work over the past few years, we are now positioned to take this care and support for animals to even greater heights.

"As the new Foundation chair, I have put into place a 'dream team' of board and committee members and charged them, along with the excellent AVMF staff, with identifying, developing, and executing programs and activities that continue to expand and enhance our five strategic areas of focus, along with our overall mission of enhancing the medical care and well-being of animals. The AVMF is truly our veterinary oath in action."

ALL IN THE FAMILY: THE INSURANCE TRUSTS

Two other AVMA partners—the insurance trusts—have delivered more than 100 years of combined coverage and service to AVMA members.

The AVMA Group Health & Life Insurance Trust hit the half-century milestone in 2006. Chartered as the AVMA Group Insurance Trust on Dec. 1, 1956, it began offering policies the following year.

In 1986, the Trust changed its name to the AVMA Group Health & Life Insurance Trust, to distinguish itself from the AVMA Professional Liability Insurance Trust, which was chartered Aug. 12, 1962. That Trust, now officially the AVMA PLIT, celebrated its 50th year of service in 2012.

The GHLIT and PLIT see themselves as part of the veterinary family. Each is supervised by a board of trustees composed of AVMA member veterinarians who have a personal understanding of their colleagues' needs and circumstances.

Veterinarians tailor the AVMA insurance programs for veterinarians. The evolution of the programs has paralleled the changing needs and demographics of AVMA members over the course of five decades.

AVMA GHLIT: PROTECTING HEALTH, LIFE, EARNINGS

As of July 2012, the AVMA Group Health & Life Insurance Trust covered about 36,000 veterinarians and their families through medical plans, disability income and life insurance, and several ancillary policies.

The Trust paid out more than $130 million in claims in the fiscal year running May 1, 2011, to April 30, 2012. Policy benefits were guaranteed-to-issue coverage, i.e., issued regardless of the member's health status. Plans are also portable and are accessible through year-round enrollment.

Libby Wallace (left), CEO of the AVMA Group Health & Life Insurance Trust, presents the Trust's sponsorship check for the 2011 Student AVMA One Health Challenge.

The GHLIT bases premiums on the claims experience of participants and their families, not on outside groups. With no profit motive, the Trust can return any excess funds to policyholders in the form of lower costs or improved coverage.

Health, life, and disability were the coverages originally offered by the AVMA GHLIT in 1957. In the ensuing decades, the trustees worked with insurance professionals to design and manage new plans arising from the needs of veterinarians and their families.

The trustees, nine AVMA member veterinarians appointed by the Executive Board and one liaison-trustee from the AVMA, ensure that the GHLIT is in sync with the changes in the veterinary profession and the needs of AVMA members. An example is the gender shift in the profession, which has driven more attention to women's needs. 2009 was the year employed women caught up in equal numbers with employed men in veterinary medicine, with female U.S. veterinary student enrollment at 75 percent that year, according to AVMA figures.

Mirroring the gender shift, half of the 10 GHLIT trustees were women in 2012. To respond to the changing gender demographics, the Trust enhanced its medical plans to include a maternity benefit and premiums based on gender.

In a 2006 JAVMA News article marking the Trust's 50th anniversary, new trustee Dr. Carolynn MacAllister noted that the GHLIT was striving to be proactive to enhance wellness and insurance products for women. Her 24 years working in academia provided her with a front-row view of the profession's evolution. Dr. MacAllister viewed osteoporosis, skin cancer, and depression as high on the list of women's health issues.

GHLIT trustee Dr. James F. Peddie with his wife, Dr. Linda Peddie, and an elephant they assisted in delivering. Dr. Peddie speaks to veterinary student groups on the value of insurance.  
Photo by Kari Johnson

Another trustee, Dr. Blair Hollowell, agreed that the profession was "evolving in a direction that requires the Trust to evolve with it."

Other enhancements in recent years have been the introduction in 2001 of plans involving medical preferred provider organizations, and in 2004, the addition of 10- and 20-year-level term life insurance, Health Savings Account–qualified plans, and dental and long-term care insurance programs.

Some AVMA members, such as Dr. Thomas Freeman, have carried insurance for their family members through the GHLIT for the 50 years since its inception. In the 50th anniversary article, Dr. Freeman said, "You can't practice like you should when you're worrying about hospital bills or what you'll do when the next baby is born. You need to put your mind at ease so you can do your job."

One way the Trust shows its commitment to wellness is through its annual sponsorship of health screenings at the AVMA Annual Convention. Every year, hundreds of veterinarians and spouses take advantage of screenings that include blood biochemical profiles, lipid tests, hemoglobin tests, prostate-specific antigen tests, and rabies titers tests.

Another way the GHLIT shows its commitment to the veterinary profession is through its efforts to educate veterinary students on the importance of healthy well-being. Trustee Dr. James F. Peddie gives his Hollywood Vets presentation to veterinary students to emphasize the importance of insurance as their personal and professional lives evolve.

The Trust also provides veterinary students with insurance coverage that is guaranteed-to-issue and affordable. The GHLIT provides packages of insurance products that fit students' needs. For example, a career-start program offers life and a long-term disability plan. The student PPO medical plan also offers coverage for rabies vaccination.

According to Libby Wallace, CEO of the GHLIT, the number of medical insureds had been slowly declining over the past 10 years, something she attributed to the growing number of corporate practices. Such practices often provide their staff members with employer-sponsored medical and disability coverage, which is not offered by the GHLIT. But in 2011, the numbers started climbing again. Wallace ascribed the rise to better marketing efforts to ensure that members know what's available to them; more competitive pricing, with premium rates seeing minimal increases in the past four years; and apprehension and uncertainty over the future of health care reform, reinforcing members' confidence in the Trust's programs.

Taking advantage of the GHLIT Wellness Center at the AVMA convention.

The GHLIT is working tirelessly to ensure the unique status of the Trust through the uncertainties of health care reform. Wallace said in 2012 the Trust was lobbying in Washington, D.C., for clarification of the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act of 2010, in conjunction with the AVMA Governmental Relations Division. In fact, the GHLIT hired a law firm well-versed in health care issues and reform to represent the best interests of insureds. Uncertainties surrounding the 2010 health care reform law have raised concerns about the sustainability of the AVMA health insurance plan.

During the AVMA Veterinary Leadership Conference in January 2012, Wallace warned that the medical insurance plan "designed by veterinarians for veterinarians and managed by veterinarians" for the past 54 years is in jeopardy of losing its unique status.

The AVMA GHLIT is classified under federal and state insurance regulations as a bona fide association health plan. These non–employer-based health plans operate under a different set of rules than non–bona fide association plans and are able to offer a number of benefits because enrollment is limited to association members.

Wallace explained that the Affordable Care Act is ambiguous on the matter of bona fide association health plans. This has led to concerns that the department responsible for implementing the reforms—Health and Human Services—could promulgate regulations that don't recognize association plans such as the GHLIT's.

Were that to happen, the Trust would have to also start offering medical coverage to individuals who are not AVMA members, once the new rules take effect Jan. 1, 2014.

"If the bona fide association designation goes away, then GHLIT medical plans would change as we know them today," she said.

The GHLIT was lobbying Congress and federal regulators to preserve bona fide association plans in the new rules, and Wallace called on veterinarians to do the same. The Trust issued a video educating AVMA members and a white paper on this and other concerns about the law, and posted an action alert on the GHLIT website so members could contact lawmakers.

What else is in store for the future? The trustees plan to expand to a new level of information technology support and analysis that will better guide development of the products the Trust offers to members. In 2012, to mark its 20th anniversary of partnering with New York Life Insurance Co., the Trust was offering a limited-time promotion: an offer of $100,000 of family group life insurance for members younger than 60, a guaranteed-issue offer of $50,000 of family group life for members younger than 55, and a guaranteed-issue offer of $1,000 a month of long-term disability coverage for members younger than 50. New York Life took over the role of underwriter from the Trust's initial underwriter, Mutual of New York, in 1991.

The Trust is also continually on the lookout for new products that would benefit members and for ways to help members make smarter insurance decisions.

AVMA PLIT: PROTECTING HONOR, REPUTATIONS, ASSETS

One of the first insurance trusts of its kind, the AVMA PLIT was founded in the 1960s to serve the malpractice insurance needs of AVMA members. A vital component of the PLIT-sponsored program has been advocating for veterinarians in the management of their claims. Insured members who are faced with allegations of negligence are backed by 50 years of Trust experience.

At present, more than 56,000 veterinarians participate in the PLIT program.

Over time, the PLIT built on the success of the malpractice insurance program by expanding into the areas of business and personal insurance. One type of business insurance added in recent years was veterinary license defense coverage, which provides up to $50,000 for legal fees to defend a veterinarian who is named in a complaint to a state licensing agency. Another, employment practices liability insurance, protects veterinarians against allegations of employment discrimination and sexual harassment.

When a claim is filed, Zurich American Insurance, the Trust's professional liability carrier, vigorously defends the veterinarian and settles legitimate claims, if the veterinarian consents or there is a court order. There is no hammer clause whereby a veterinarian who did not consent to settle a claim would assume personal liability if the court were to order a higher judgment later. Rates never increase for a veterinarian who reports a potential claim or receives a payment for defense or indemnity.

In an educational photo shoot, AVMA PLIT Trust representative Dr. Karen Wernette simulates treating a dog while a veterinary technician demonstrates proper restraint.

In 1984, the Trust launched its first business insurance product by leveraging members' group buying power to offer coverage for on-the-job injuries through workers' compensation insurance. This policy has evolved to include a dividend potential (by law, dividends cannot be guaranteed in advance), post-exposure rabies treatment, and coverage for volunteers, as permitted by state law. The primary business insurance carriers, The Hartford and Travelers, waive automatic subrogation, a standard insurance provision in which workers' compensation carriers have the right to recover from the policyholder's clients if their animals injure practice employees. The Hartford and Travelers rarely subrogate against veterinarians' clients, because it can foster ill will.

The PLIT introduced the practice owner's package policy in 1992 to address several previously uncovered or underinsured areas, such as property damage caused by patients, potential exposures of mobile-practice owners, and extended coverage for biological property. Data breach exposures and cyber liability were added recently.

Besides practice policies, the Trust offers comprehensive personal insurance through Liberty Mutual's homeowners, renters, and auto policies. In 2012, the Trust launched a group personal excess liability product through the Chubb Group to provide another layer of protection to those policies.

The PLIT's golden jubilee year of 2012 began on a high note, according to a JAVMA News article marking the Trust's 50th anniversary. Annual malpractice premium rates for primary and excess malpractice coverage decreased 15 percent for classes I (equine) and II (food animal), and 5 percent for classes III (mixed animal practice) and IV (small animal).

Malpractice claims were down from 2010 to 2011, when one of about every 19 veterinarians reported a potential claim. The PLIT attributes these positive results, in part, to its increased emphasis and substantial investment in safety, risk management tools, and communication training.

In the veterinary profession, dog bites, cat scratches, horse kicks, and other patient-inflicted injuries cause the most workers' compensation claims, to the tune of about 2,000 a year. To combat this, the PLIT offers other risk management resources, from online employee training to newsletters and a safety manual.

The primary employment practices liability carrier, CNA Insurance, tailors its risk management resources to the veterinary profession by developing educational resources for policyholders such as webinars, unlimited access to a toll-free help line, and a Web-based platform that helps train employees.

Communication training is a kind of preventive medicine offered by the PLIT to improve client compliance and satisfaction, reducing policyholders' potential for malpractice claims. Most professional liability claims and state board complaints reflect an element of communication breakdown, according to anecdotal information from the Trust and data from the veterinary profession in Canada.

The PLIT embarked on a communication education initiative in 2007. As part of it, the Trust representatives participated in the Bayer Animal Health Communication Project, receiving professional training on how to deliver communication topics to veterinary groups. The Trust representatives present communication training modules at veterinary meetings.

The newest PLIT educational program premiered in August at the 2012 AVMA Annual Convention in San Diego. "A Privilege to Practice, Strategies for Protection" was created to educate veterinary practice teams about the top claim drivers along with exposures for on-the-job injuries and practice losses. Dr. Richard DeBowes of Washington State University moderated the program.

The PLIT board of trustees consists of seven veterinarians appointed by the AVMA Executive Board and one liaison-trustee from the AVMA. The trustees oversee the PLIT program to ensure that it evolves with the profession's changing needs. They work closely with Dr. Rodney Johnson, PLIT CEO, along with advisers who include legal counsel and a consulting actuary.

The Trust relies heavily on its team of in-house representatives, three veterinarians with extensive practice experience. The PLIT representatives work with Dr. Johnson to review reported malpractice claims, speak to veterinarians about potential allegations of negligence, and provide guidance. They refer Zurich American to veterinary experts who assist in professional liability and veterinary license defense and provide veterinary insight to its attorneys.

"It is a great honor and responsibility to serve as the PLIT Trust chair during our 50th anniversary," said Dr. R.C. Ebert II, in the anniversary article in JAVMA. "With more than 200 years of combined experience in our profession, the PLIT trustees are proud to support the PLIT's mission: to provide a valuable AVMA member service that protects the assets and reputations of the participants and enhances the image of the profession.

"Also, we have been very fortunate to have been associated with HUB, the same broker for the past 50 years. Your team of advocates—the PLIT trustees and Trust representatives, with the expertise of HUB—plan to enhance our services in several areas, including claim analysis and personal liability."

When asked about the PLIT's next 50 years, Dr. Ebert responded, "Our goal remains solid—operate as veterinarians serving veterinarians, sponsoring an insurance program that offers the very best in asset and business protection."

TRUSTS SUPPORT FUTURE VETERINARIANS

Dr. Jack Dinsmore

The commitment of the AVMA insurance trusts to veterinary students is evident in many ways.

The late Dr. Jack Dinsmore devoted much of his effort as a trustee for both the AVMA GHLIT and AVMA PLIT to meeting and talking with graduating students. In the GHLIT's 50th anniversary article in JAVMA, Dr. Dinsmore recalled, "We worked to get the program in front of the students. I was in every veterinary school every year, along with my colleague (Dr.) David McConnell, making presentations about group health and professional liability insurance."

The GHLIT continues to educate veterinary students about coverage-related issues. To help new veterinarians get started on a sound footing, the Trust makes a special offer to Student AVMA members at graduation: guaranteed issue of vital coverage, including health, disability, life, and accidental death and dismemberment, regardless of pre-existing conditions. Their eligible dependents are also guaranteed health and life insurance coverage.

A few years ago, the GHLIT added the business of veterinary practice to its student priorities. Two trustees, Drs. Jody Johnson and Ted Trimmer, became involved with many of the schools in a mentoring program that emphasizes the business aspects of veterinary practice.

The GHLIT is also involved with the Student AVMA One Health Project, formerly the One Health Challenge, which promotes the one-health concept through collaborative partnerships and yearly initiatives that have included rabies and obesity awareness as well as vector-borne disease control. In 2012, the GHLIT provided SAVMA with more than $20,000 to promote the project and provide AVMA student chapters with funds to host events based on the one-health theme chosen by the SAVMA one-health working committee.

PLIT representatives visit veterinary colleges every year to educate students about avoiding malpractice allegations. Helping in this pursuit are PLIT student ambassadors, who keep their classmates apprised of the PLIT program and services, such as student liability coverage. The PLIT also worked with veterinary colleges to develop a blanket student liability policy to eliminate the paperwork for individual students.

New in 2012, the PLIT donated $96,000 for scholarships to assist veterinary students with their educational debt. The Trust disbursed the funds equally to 32 U.S., Canadian, and Caribbean veterinary schools that the Trust representatives visit annually to give educational presentations.

The PLIT also supports student events such as the annual Student AVMA Symposium and the Opportunities in Equine Practice Seminar, as well as the Veterinary Business Management Association for students. In 2012, the PLIT also co-sponsored the annual AVMA Veterinary Leadership Experience, a multiday leadership development program for veterinary students that stresses the importance of balancing medical and surgical competencies with important life skills. The GHLIT has also been a VLE co-sponsor.

AVMA PLIT True representative Dr. Linda Ellis (at left, middle row) with the Veterinary Leadership Experience student group in 2008.
