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The Cost of Caring: Veterinary Mental Health Crisis

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Trigger Warning: Suicide

The Veterinary Suicide Rate

On average, a vet dies by suicide approximately every 12 weeks¹.

Veterinary staff jobs are often portrayed as simply cuddling puppies and kittens, but the reality is far more complex and emotionally demanding. They are frontline workers, caring for your beloved pets, while facing a mental health crisis at alarmingly high rates.

Over the last three decades, the rate of suicide in the profession has steadily increased, with research confirming that veterinarians are four times more likely to die by suicide than the general population¹.

This is not news to anyone working in the industry, as they are likely to have their own versions and experiences of a work-related ‘suicide story’. A study found that nearly 70% of veterinarians have lost a colleague or peer to suicide².
However, what is new are campaigns bringing it to public attention. Campaigns and foundations, such as Sophie’s Legacy, are shining a light on what has mostly been kept in the dark.

Who Is Sophie?

Dr. Sophie Putland was a dedicated veterinarian who worked in Adelaide and Melbourne. She spent the last stage of her career working at one of the largest animal emergency clinics in Adelaide as an emergency veterinarian.

She was working in a profession she loved and was passionate about. But the stress that came with it took its toll.

A picture of Sophie and her two dogs, a french bulldog and a golden retriever.

In September 2021, she tragically took her own life at just 33 years old. The pressure of the veterinary profession, including client abuse, became overwhelming for her. Before she committed suicide, she experienced a case of client abuse whilst she was working.

A number of our staff members had the pleasure of working with and being friends with Sophie before her passing.

What Is Sophie’s Legacy?

Following the death of their much-loved daughter and sister, Sophie’s family (Kate, Garry, Tom, and Oliver) established the Sophie’s Legacy foundation.

They aim to save the people who save your pets and prevent more tragic deaths of veterinary staff, by advocating for change, providing support and spreading the message.

They have driven awareness campaigns, advocated on many media channels and held fundraising events.

Sophie’s Legacy have lobbied for government policy and industry change to provide more mental health support for vet professionals, contributed to the NSW Parliamentary Inquiry into Veterinary Workforce Shortages and made a submission to the South Australian Inquiry into Veterinarian Mental Health and Wellbeing.

What Is Causing The High Suicide Rates In Veterinarians?

It goes without saying that this is a systemic, complex and multifaceted issue. There is not just one singular reason for the crisis, but perhaps breaking it down into smaller pieces can help us make sense of it.

We are not psychologists or experts, but we do have our own theories as to why vets have one of the highest suicide rates of all professions. Through personal experience, conversations and research, here are some of the reasons that contribute to the crisis:

Abuse

An undeniable contributor to the veterinary mental health epidemic is client abuse. In 2022, a Sophie’s Legacy survey found that 88% of veterinary staff reported client abuse and expectations were the number one contributor to poor mental health³.

Do we get death threats?

Have we had to call the police?

Have we had to secure the building to keep someone out?

Have we escorted people out of the building as they punched walls and doors along the way?

Do we get called things that are too inappropriate to write here?

Have we had things thrown at us?

Have we had to block phone numbers of people who won’t stop calling to verbally abuse us?

Have we had someone threaten to burn our building down with us still in it?

Yes.

Last year, a veterinarian in South Australia had to get a police restraining order against a client who repeatedly walked past her practice and mimicked slitting her throat. For her own safety, staff had to escort her to and from her car every day.

While these are chilling examples of client abuse that the veterinary industry tolerates, there’s more to it than that.

You will be forgiven for thinking that “client abuse” only refers to these cases of extreme verbal abuse and threats to our safety that end with a physical altercation. Whilst this absolutely does happen and has devastating effects on staff, there is another variety that we see nearly every single day. It’s non-police reportable.

The passive-aggressive tones, the snide remarks, the spiteful comments, the eyerolls and moans, the constant jabs, the emotional blackmail – slowly wearing us down or winding us up.

“You don’t even care, you just want my money.”

“If you don’t treat my dog, I will take him home and shoot him.”

“I was late to my appointment, but the vet can just see me on their lunch break.”

“If you really cared, you’d do it for free.”

“You’re not even a real doctor.”

“It’s only 50c for a bullet.”

“I’ve probably paid off your new car by now.”

“Why can’t you just stay back late tonight to call me back?”

“I only need medication, you just want me to come in so you can make more money!”

“Don’t you dare put a muzzle on my dog, being bitten is a part of your job.”

“All you vets are a rip off.”

“It’s not that hard, just do your job.”

Comments accumulate on top of the remarks made by the person before, and they will likely be echoed by the person after. A seemingly innocent statement or “joke” is another elbow in the ribcage. Elbow after elbow in the ribcage until we feel we can’t breathe.
These remarks slowly chip away at the foundation that our morals were built on and call into question everything we stand for.

We see it, we hear it, we feel it. Then we take it home and stare at the ceiling whilst we think about it.

The reasons for client abuse toward veterinarians are as complex and varied as the factors contributing to the veterinary mental health crisis itself. A client’s mental or emotional state can sometimes play a role, which is then compounded by other issues, such as:

Pets Are Family

The line between a family member and a pet has blurred. Gone are the days when dogs lived in the backyard, were maybe walked once a week, fed purely table scraps, and never stepped into a vet clinic. Only the lucky ones crossed the threshold from ‘animal’ to ‘pet’.

It’s now commonplace for dogs to live inside, sleep on their own plush bed (if not the human’s bed), be fed a human-grade diet, and have a never-ending supply of toys. They enjoy cuddles on the couch, road trips, cafes, and doggy day care. They have their own Instagram pages and birthday parties.

They are ingrained in our everyday lives and are extensions of our families. We love them as much as our children. We want the best for our pets because, to us, they are the best.

As the affection and emotional connection to pets increase, so too does the demand for their medical care and well-being. More care, more expectation, more pressure.

Financial Stress

Unlike human healthcare, which is subsidised heavily by the government’s Medicare scheme, pet owners are responsible for 100% of their animals’ medical costs (more on that later).

Veterinary medicine is getting more expensive as it continually advances. We have increased access to sophisticated surgical equipment and procedures, advanced medical imaging, and a growing number of specialist veterinarians. We commonly refer to specialists in areas such as surgery, dermatology, ophthalmology, internal medicine/endocrinology, pathology, oncology, critical care/emergency, radiology, neurology, anaesthesia, cardiology, and dentistry.

As you can imagine, these improvements in veterinary care and the use of human-grade equipment like MRI, CAT scans, and ultrasound (among many others) come at a higher cost.

As the cost of living rises and funds are stretched, owners have less money to spend on veterinary care, which is becoming more expensive at the same time. The emotional distress of an injured or unwell beloved pet, coinciding with financial constraints, is a recipe for disaster.

Blame

It is human nature to want to make sense of something and understand how and why something happened. Humans seek answers, a physical and tangible explanation for the unexplainable, something that makes sense.

It’s difficult to comprehend how their seemingly healthy ‘furbaby’ from yesterday is now fighting for its life today. But what does make sense, to the owner at least, is that the patient died and the vet wasn’t able to save it. The owners desire something, or someone, to blame, and all arrows point to the vet.

If they weren’t able to afford treatment for their pet, they blame the vet for being “too expensive”.

The more owners care about their pets, the more intense the blame game becomes.

Predisposition

There is a joke that goes, “Am I mentally unstable because I work in the veterinary industry, or am I in the veterinary industry because I am mentally unstable?”

Although this may be lighthearted humour, it touches on a truth about the veterinary profession. Veterinary professionals are driven by an innate empathy and genuine concern for animals and their well-being. This profound compassion is what leads many of them to choose this career path in the first place.

Veterinary professionals are empathetic and caring—that’s why they chose the career, but it’s also why they leave. They are susceptible to emotional burnout and overwhelming stress. The same compassion that led them to the profession leads to compassion fatigue. They pursued their career because they care, and they leave the profession because they care too much.

Nature Of The Work

The veterinary industry is a high-stress, high-emotion environment.

It goes without saying that veterinary staff love animals, it’s the reason they choose this field. Yet, their job means they witness animals in pain and suffering. They grapple with horrific cases of abuse and neglect that can haunt their sleep.

Veterinary staff develop anxiety, panic disorders and depression from dealing with animals that were injured on purpose.

Veterinary staff face some of the most harrowing experiences, and then they come back to work the next day and do it all again.

Then again. And again.

Their days are full of highs and lows, where they emotionally pivot from guiding a devastated family through euthanasia to immediately seeing an excited family with a brand new puppy.

On top of that, staff often work long days, late nights, and weekends, frequently going without proper breaks. Emergency staff, in particular, face overnight or even longer shifts. Furthermore, vets in regional practices who provide on-call services may be at the clinic all night for an emergency and continue to work through the next day.

Working under these intense conditions takes an immense toll on empathetic people, frequently leading to burnout.

Internalised Pressure

Vets hold themselves to a high standard; they do not accept failure. They are intelligent and perform very well academically – they have to, as an ATAR score as high as 99.7 is required to study veterinary medicine*. This requirement is higher than that for human medicine.

However, this academic success doesn’t always translate to the real world. Where they once thrived, they are now fighting. A patient dying is seen as a failure. Being unable to find the cure, the reason, or the solution is considered a failure. Vets feel like they have failed the animal, the owner, and themselves.

They don’t have all the answers anymore. Everything makes sense in theory, but why does nothing make sense in practice? Learning to live and work through failure is very difficult.

Patients unfortunately die, and we sometimes don’t know why. Vets can internalise and feel guilty, responsible and shame. “What else should I have done? What could I have done differently? What did I miss?” That’s a heavy burden to carry.

Social Media/The Internet

There are websites and social media pages dedicated to discrediting veterinary advice, and they are a significant source of misinformation. This trend leads people to follow advice from online forums and TikTok videos rather than from a qualified and experienced veterinarian who has actually examined their animal.

This creates distrust toward veterinary professionals, who are often accused of working for “big pharma”. Veterinarians are being wrongly accused of only recommending specific pet foods and medications because the company pays them to do so. In reality, veterinarians make these recommendations based on their professional expertise and opinion, not financial incentives or “kick-backs”.

On top of that, look at any comment section of a post involving a veterinary clinic, and you’ll find comment after comment of ‘vet bashing’. Derogatory statements about how much people hate vets, how they are greedy, uncaring, and the list goes on. There are designated Facebook pages purely for running smear campaigns against vet clinics and ‘Naming and Shaming’ individual veterinarians.

Imagine seeing something horrendous written about yourself or your profession over and over again.

Veterinarians have been victims of online smear campaigns and bullying, and then committed suicide as a result.

Before social media and the age of the internet, if you had a ‘bad’ experience at a veterinary clinic that failed to meet your expectations, you would keep that experience to yourself, perhaps venting about it to a friend during your next catch-up. Nowadays, you can write about it in Facebook comment sections or post a scathing Google review.

The ability to share emotionally fueled feedback is instantaneous. This leads to the spread of information and misinformation, contributing to the formation of a collective experience based on various people’s negative encounters, not just your own. Your experience becomes someone else’s, and someone else’s experience becomes yours. Therefore, when you visit a vet clinic, you can hold other people’s hatred and judgments, whether consciously or subconsciously, and form a preconceived bias.

Low Salary vs Assumptions

Veterinarians put themselves in a lot of debt for a career that is not as high-paying as the general public assumes.

New graduate vets, who have just spent 5-7 years studying to gain their degree, have a minimum annual salary of $64,517ˆ. The minimum salary in Australia is $49,301˜. Depending on where they studied, they could have over $75,000 of HECS debt. Financial strain is a major contributor to poor mental health.

Wages increase with time and experience. The minimum full-time annual salary for an experienced GP veterinarian is $91,258 a yearˆ. By comparison, a GP doctor in human medicine earns on average $250,000 annually, but the salary can range between $150,000 to over $400,000¹¹.

Our veterinarians are paid a salary based on their hourly rate and do not earn a commission or percentage of the work they bill.
In contrast, human GPs often earn a percentage of the billings from their consultations. This means the more work they do, the more they get paid, which is not the case for veterinarians.

When our veterinarian advises surgery for a patient, it is not in the vet’s financial interest. Instead, their recommendations are based solely on what they believe is best for the pet.

For example, our veterinarian may perform a life-saving, extremely complicated, and delicate surgery that costs the owner $3500. At the end, the vet will be paid the same hourly rate as if they had not performed the surgery at all.
Is the answer to pay the vet more to do the surgery? Maybe, but then the cost of the surgery goes up.

When vets feel every suggestion they make is perceived as a sales pitch, it can be draining. They entered the field because they genuinely care, not to earn a commission. This constant emotional burden, coupled with the feeling that their motives are being questioned, can be really damaging.

Staff Shortages

There is a worldwide veterinary staff shortage. In New Zealand, for example, if trends continue at the current rate, it is projected that by 2029 the entire industry will be unsustainable¹². Supply is not keeping up with demand.

Pet ownership has been increasing, with over 70% of Australian households now having at least one pet¹³. We have roughly 1 doctor per 200 people, but only 1 veterinarian per 2000 pets²². The combination of increased pet ownership and decreased veterinary staff is causing strain on the industry to cope.

A graphic with a blue background and white icons. On the left, a human icon is shown with the text "1 x 200 Doctors per human." On the right, a dog icon is shown with the text "1 x 2000 Vets per pet."

The industry also has a 25% turnover rate, meaning that 1 in 4 staff members will leave the industry, which is double the national average. For every 10 available positions advertised, only 1 person will apply³³.

The more people that leave, the harder it gets; the harder it gets, the more people leave.

Euthanasia

It is an honour and a privilege to be able to alleviate a pet from its pain and suffering in a controlled environment surrounded by those who love it dearly. It is not taken lightly. That doesn’t come without consequences, however, as the emotional toll that comes from performing euthanasia is well documented.

This also leads to perhaps the most uncomfortable thought regarding the high suicide rates in the veterinary industry.

Veterinary staff see death as an option, a way out.

They perform euthanasia day in and day out, creating desensitisation and an association that death is always there as a choice that can be made.

That isn’t to say that we don’t want to be able to perform euthanasia, it is a very important part of our job. In fact, most veterinary professionals would agree that it is more distressing to see an animal suffering than it is to help it pass humanely.

Access

All of these risk factors are compounded by the access veterinary professionals have to lethal means.

Clinics have a supply of powerful drugs and euthanasia solutions, and these medications are the most common method of suicide for veterinarians. In fact, if suicides involving euthanasia drugs were not counted, the suicide rate for veterinarians would be similar to that of the general population²³.

Additionally, large animal veterinarians carry these drugs, along with a variety of firearms.

What Can Be Done To Help?

So, what can be done to help? If there is a solution, it is not a simple one. Here are some ideas that we think can help:

Have Compassion

Be compassionate and understand that veterinary staff are trying their hardest to do one of the most emotionally taxing jobs.

If the team is running late, please be respectful and understand that it is likely because a prior patient required extra time and care due to being unwell, and the vet was trying to help them – in the same way that they would spend extra time with your pet if they needed it.

If you think the veterinarian wasn’t happy enough in consult, it may be because they just performed back-to-back euthanasias or had to inform a client that the test results show their beloved pet has cancer.

If you are annoyed because the vet hasn’t returned your call yet, it could be because it’s 4:00pm and they haven’t stopped to eat lunch yet.

They do not pursue this career because they want to argue or be yelled at. They want to treat your animal to the best of their ability and then go home knowing that they did everything they could and that it was appreciated.

We’re only human.

Understand Why It’s Expensive

Veterinary care can be expensive, which isn’t a groundbreaking revelation, but despite the rumours and social media comments, this isn’t fueled by greed.

Veterinary clinics are private businesses that receive no government subsidies or support. Owning, operating, and maintaining a clinic comes with huge financial overhead. Everything a clinic buys, including human-grade medical equipment and machines worth hundreds of thousands of dollars, is purchased with their own money.

In Australia, we are fortunate to have government schemes that support our human healthcare needs. We have Medicare to help pay for doctor and hospital visits, free treatment at emergency hospitals, and the Pharmaceutical Benefits Scheme (PBS) to subsidise prescription medication.

Additionally, many people have private health insurance to help with further costs. If you have private health insurance, you are eligible for the private health insurance rebate, which is a government rebate that helps reduce the cost of your premiums.

Veterinary medicine has no equivalent version of Medicare, the PBS or insurance rebates, meaning owners are responsible for 100% of their animal’s medical costs.

Vets dispense human medication to patients, and it will be more expensive than if you were to be prescribed it for yourself by a human GP. This is because, thanks to the PBS, humans can buy prescription medication for less than what veterinary clinics can even purchase it for.
You may see a human GP and be bulk-billed, meaning you don’t have to pay anything. That is because, thanks to Medicare, the costs were covered by the government.

If money were taken out of the equation, clients would be happier, pets healthier, and vets less stressed. Ask anyone in the veterinary industry, and they will assure you that they wish they could treat your pet for free.

If we could provide veterinary care for free while keeping the doors open, the shelves stocked, the equipment available, the lights on, and the staff paid, we would.
We absolutely would.

If you want to learn more about the costs associated with owning and operating a veterinary clinic, you can read our blog: Why Are Vets Expensive?

Get Pet Insurance

The high cost of vet care isn’t the veterinary industry’s fault; it’s just a reality. Ultimately, your pet’s medical treatment is your financial responsibility, not your vet’s.

Pet insurance can help by providing funds when you need them most, easing both the financial burden and the stress that comes with unexpected medical bills.

You can learn more about pet insurance here: Pet Insurance Blog

Optimise Choice

If you are unhappy with a service you have received from a veterinary clinic, simply go elsewhere and find a suitable fit. It is perfectly acceptable that not every vet clinic can match every individual pet owner’s requirements.

You have choices. You may find you are better suited to an independently owned veterinary clinic, whereas other people prefer corporate-owned businesses.

If you find a veterinarian that you like and they move to a new clinic, you are absolutely welcome to transfer to that clinic.

Spread The Word

You can help combat the negative bias the industry faces by speaking out when you hear or read harmful language about the profession.

Encourage others to treat veterinary staff with compassion. Share the shocking statistics. Use resources like this one and those listed below to provide more context.

The more people standing with us, the stronger we become.

Make The Promise

Sophie’s Legacy created a campaign called ‘We’re Only Human’.

The campaign asks pet owners to make the promise to be kind and respectful and to understand the massive pressures impacting staff.

You can make the promise here: We’re Only Human

Sign The Petition

Help Sophie’s Legacy reduce the high suicide rate in the veterinary profession by signing their ‘LOST’ campaign petition.

The campaign aims to secure improved mental health support, promote healthy workplaces, and influence government policy to address the long-term needs of the industry.

Sign the petition here: LOST

Donate

You can donate to Sophie’s Legacy so they can provide more support to veterinary professionals and take care of those who look after your beloved pets.

They also welcome fundraising events, from fun runs to morning teas to corporate events. If you are thinking of raising money for a charity, please consider Sophie’s Legacy.

You can donate here: DONATE