Anaesthesia Residency Programme (ECVAA)

Davies Veterinary Specialists are one of the largest and most diverse small animal referral hospitals in Europe. We are based in Hertfordshire, and our practice is home to over 200 dedicated, experienced, and passionate veterinary specialists, nurses and support teams. Our promise is to deliver outstanding care to all patients, whilst committing to being a gold standard sustainable place to work. We are a friendly, welcoming practice that leads the way in multi-specialist care. Set in a pleasant rural location, but just a 40-minute train ride to the cultural delights and nightlife of London, Davies offers a good work- life balance with plenty of time to enjoy the surroundings.

Davies Veterinary Specialists (DVS) is an approved training centre for ECVAA and has been involved in anaesthesia training for external ECVAA residents and residents from other European Colleges.  Davies Veterinary Specialists is a small animal-only referral practice based in Hertfordshire, UK.

Anaesthesia residents are be predominantly based at DVS; here they participate in the daily clinical activity in the small animal hospital, providing perioperative and anaesthetic care to small animal patients in the hospital and supporting other specialists and trainees in internal medicine, cardiology, soft tissue and orthopaedic surgery, neurology and dentistry/maxillofacial surgery. Residents are involved in the provision of an out-of-hours anaesthesia service, providing support to the emergencies accepted by the other disciplines and inpatient care.  The residents will be expected to work no more than 1 in 4 on call and will have back-up supervision provided by an ECVAA diplomat or board-eligible clinician at all times.  Structured residency training programmes are currently in place at DVS in the following disciplines: surgery (ECVS), neurology (ECVN), diagnostic imaging (ECVDI) and internal medicine (ECVIM).  These programs allow anaesthesia residents to access cross-discipline journal clubs, radiology rounds, physiology club and fortnightly presentations delivered by interns and residents.  In addition to these activities, access to anaesthesia-specific journal clubs and resident rounds is available; these alternate between being delivered on site every fortnight and virtually (accessible to all diplomats and residents across the Linnaeus group).  Residents will be allocated a total of 5 weeks per year for research and didactic study.  They will be receive 5 days for undertaking additional external CPD, such as attending relevant conferences.

As the clinical caseload at DVS is predominantly cats and dogs (with occasional ferrets, rabbits and rodents), externships are necessary to meet the requirement of the ECVAA in respect of experience and case load in equines, large/farm animals, and wild/exotic animals. To gain the required experience, the resident will visit other institutions with the aim of working in the species that are not commonly seen at DVS. External clinical rotations are expected to make up approximately 8 weeks per year.  The timings and locations of externships will be decided by the resident’s supervisor.  Financial support will be provided to residents to enable them to undertake the required externships.

The residency is expected to run over a 3-year period.The resident will initially work under close supervision of ECVAA diplomats (or residency trained clinicians); as they progress through the training program, it is expected that they will start gradually taking more responsibility. For this reason, they will not work alone out of hours initially. Regular assessment of his progress will be performed with meeting with the supervisors.  By the end of the first year, they should be able to manage with minimal supervision anaesthesia of patients with physical condition ASA I-III and manage most of out of hours emergencies when they are on call. During the first year, residents are expected to improve their knowledge of physics, physiology and pharmacology, gaining a solid grounding in basic sciences relevant to anaesthesiology.  The first original study will be decided and data collection will begin. They will be introduced to some basic locoregional anaesthetic techniques (epidural, peripheral nerve block of the hindlimb). By the end of the first year, they will be expected to be able to perform arterial and central venous catheterisation confidently under supervision. In the second year of residency, it is expected that the resident will be able to manage critical patients and will be more involved in perioperative intensive care and in analgesia. They will be encouraged to improve their knowledge in statistics applied to veterinary medicine, human anaesthesia and veterinary physiopathology. The resident will improve their knowledge in locoregional anaesthesia and they will be expected to gain familiarity with more complex locoregional techniques and to be able to perform central venous catheterisation without supervision. They should be able to teach the rotating interns on anaesthesia rotation at DVS, to be involved in providing training for new and existing nurses and give anaesthetic advice/support to nurses. In the final year of the residency, they will be expected to work independently with minimal direct supervision, be able to discuss advanced topics in anaesthesia and give advice to general practitioners contacting the clinic.