Veterinary technician degree programs provide students with the formal training they need to perform a variety of clinical and technical duties in animal shelters, clinics, research laboratories, veterinary offices, and zoos. This important job requires formal accreditation and training to ensure the individual has what it takes to meet the many technical demands of the vet tech profession. During a veterinary technology degree program, students become veterinary professionals.
There are many technical skills that students acquire during the completion of accredited veterinary technician degree programs, such as the following:
– Hematology
– Microbiology
– Radiology procedures
– Serology
– Skin scrapes
– Urine analysis
– Venipuncture
Veterinary Technical Training Standards
To perform all of those tasks, vet tech professionals must have the proper training and must be certified. Training consists of a minimum of a two-year associate’s degree, although many vet techs actually have four-year bachelor’s degrees these days. To ensure that this education is consistent with the requirements for the job, most employers require veterinary technician degrees accredited by the American Veterinary Medical Association. After earning a degree, graduates must also pass a credentialing exam administered by state authorities.
Schooling is not required after graduation from a licensed veterinary technician. However, vet techs often enroll in advanced courses to improve their job opportunities or simply to improve their education and stay sharp on the job.
The future of the profession
Although the field of veterinary technology is still fairly new, it has become a mainstay of the modern job market, because people in our society think of their animals as members of their families. Pets need the same kind of health care as people. This is why a sharp increase in the number of career opportunities for vet techs in the United States is projected. The modern veterinary office cannot function without qualified technicians to help, and veterinary offices are here to stay.
Veterinarians need help applying splints or other protective devices, cleaning animals’ teeth, determining the cause of illness or injury, dressing wounds, performing physical exams, recording temperatures, and taking animals’ pulses and respiration. Vet techs also provide administrative support with tasks such as keeping treatment records and taking inventories of all pharmaceuticals, equipment, and supplies. They even help with the surgery by providing anesthetics and surgical equipment/instruments and generally running the equipment and supporting the vet.
