PITTSBURGH – At least a dozen employees at Avalon Veterinary Hospital have left the practice due to burnout in the past few months.
“When you’re busy and busy, there’s only so much you can physically do,” said Avalon’s practice manager Tawnya Roman.
So what’s behind the huge backlog of veterinary appointments? The pandemic.
“Many people have had pets during COVID-19 who have never had pets. You were at home. They needed to do something to fill their time, ”said Roman.
But now that results in less time for employees and in some cases, Roman said, it creates a difficult work environment.
“A much shorter fuse, shall we say. They expect to come immediately when called. They expect their patients to be seen right away, and what hurts the most is when someone says they don’t care about pets. We still love pets just as much, ”said Roman.
Her facility currently has five doctors on staff and each sees around 20 animals each day. To combat burn-out, she said the number of opening times was reduced from 12 to 10.
“We’ve almost seen employee churn, and not because they don’t necessarily like where they work. You are leaving the industry because the stress and expectations of customers are too high every day, ”said Roman.
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