For anyone interested in working in our practice, we don’t mind whether you are a new graduate, have been qualified for a few years or are an experienced veterinary surgeon. We have a staff structure which can accommodate you and take you forward in your professional career as well as providing you with unrivalled job satisfaction.
We are firm believers that having a better quality of life will result in a happier working environment, so time to relax and do things other than veterinary medicine is a priority. To best achieve this we work a four day working week, with one day off rotating each week. Although we cover all out-of-hours ourselves on an equally shared rota, without the use of an emergency clinic, we also enjoy seven weeks’ holiday per year (35 working days) and an additional three days off in the week following every on-duty weekend. This means that if you’ve worked a weekend, in the following week you are off from Tuesday evening to the following Monday morning!
We recognise the professional obligation of veterinary surgeons to continually enhance their skills, and Continuing Professional Development (CPD) is therefore supported both financially and by allowing periods of absence for CPD. All veterinary surgeons get five days’ paid CPD per year plus a generous CPD allowance. In addition, we also fund in-house CPD which is closely allied to the needs of the practice. For example, any newly employed veterinary surgeon will receive one to one training, in working time, to develop and improve their imaging capabilities and enable them to take full advantage of the practice’s diagnostic facilities for ultrasound and eventually MRI.
We are an RCVS recognised New Graduate Development Practice with a fully trained Vet GDP Adviser who also happens to have lots of previous experience in helping newly fledged veterinary graduates turn into confident veterinary surgeons.
We undertake to give you a wide range of surgical and medical competencies with extensive support and training. Hopefully you will see from what our current staff have written about working here that this is not an empty promise. Our word is our bond; if we have promised you something, we deliver.
Until both we and, very importantly, you feel that you are competent in a surgical procedure, you will be accompanied in theatre by an experienced surgeon who will take you through the procedure and guide and advise you, gradually becoming more ‘hands-off’ as you gain confidence.
When you are consulting, you will be able to discuss with an experienced colleague any case you are about to see. A provisional approach and plan can be proposed, and we find that this preparation gives a new face credibility in the consulting room and goes a long way to gaining the confidence of the client. The sooner clients are asking to see you again rather than anyone else, the happier we shall be. It means that they like you and trust you.
For your first couple of months of night duty and at least your first two weekend duties, you will be accompanied by a senior veterinary surgeon who will advise and mentor you and who will step in if it is thought necessary. Even when you are eventually on your own, a senior vet will always be available on the end of a telephone to be consulted and to give advice and support on any cases which concern you.
What we do ask of you is that you are prepared to try new things, to move out of your comfort zone, to really want to be as good as and even better than everyone else at procedures you may never even have seen before. Remember, you will have massive support all around you, but you still have to take your personal steps into the unknown.
Finally, you will not have to fulfil sales targets. You won’t have the embarrassment of trying to sell products or services to people who don’t want them and can’t afford them. We also have a generous starting salary for recent graduates and we provide excellent accommodation away from the main surgery if you need it.
If you need accommodation, we will provide you with a fully-furnished flat away from the surgery in a nice area with good off-road parking. It is completely rent- and rates-free, you only have to pay for the flat's gas, electricity and water bills. If anything breaks down, leaks or falls apart, you simply call us. We employ our own team of builders and will get it sorted asap.
After two years, you will be competent in all the standard elective surgeries as well as bowel and bladder surgery, GDV, caesareans, aural resection and complex wound repair involving tissue mobilisation. You will be competent to interpret all standard laboratory findings and will be doing high-quality medical workups. You will be able to accurately interpret radiographs of all parts of the body and carry out basic ultrasound. You will have had a taste of other more complex surgical and imaging techniques which you can develop further here if you choose to do so.
Career Development at the Abbey Veterinary CentreSome people are happy to remain as excellent GPs all their lives and feel no need to specialize. As the GP is the backbone of any practice, there will always be a place for the generalist. However, many vets want more than this from their careers and we are very happy to fulfil those aspirations.
If you are interested in imaging, we would start by increasing your ultrasound case-load and introduce you to endoscopy and our three-dimensional imaging modalities. If you are interested in orthopaedics, we already do complex joint and spinal surgery and would be happy for you to get involved. Whatever studies you think would improve your workplace quality of life, whether it’s dermatology, neurology, cardiology, ophthalmology, oncology, or something else, if it will benefit the practice and our clients, we would be very happy to put the practice facilities at your disposal and to fully fund your CPD. We have no funding limits or caps.
If you wish to study for a certificate, the practice will give you all the support it can. For people who graduated two years ago or more, we pay the entire cost of studying for a certificate, providing you are willing to commit to remaining working with us for the period of study and for one year after you have been awarded your certificate. We also give additional CPD time to all certificate candidates, so studying for a certificate does not have to eat into your holiday periods.
When you come to work for us, or if you have joined us as a new grad and have hit your year two targets, the big question is ‘quo vadis?’ – Where do I go from here?
If you have come from another practice, we would sit down with you and work out firstly where your general skill set may need strengthening. For example, you may have come from a practice where all the dermatology, ultrasound or cardiology cases were passed on to a colleague who had a special interest in the field. That’s quite common and no reflection on you, but you’ll need a certain level of competence in these skills to be a good GP. We would then make sure that through mentoring and CPD we provided what you need.
Some people are happy to remain as excellent GPs all their lives and feel no need to specialize. Veterinary GPs are the backbone of any practice so there will always be a place for the generalist. However, many vets want more than this from their careers and we are very happy to fulfil those aspirations.
If you are interested in imaging, we would start by increasing your ultrasound case-load and introduce you to endoscopy and our three-dimensional imaging protocols. If you are interested in orthopaedics, we already do complex joint and spinal surgery and would be happy for you to get involved. Whatever studies you think would improve your workplace quality of life, whether it’s dermatology, neurology, cardiology, ophthalmology, oncology, or something else, if it will benefit the practice and our clients, we would be very happy to put the practice facilities at your disposal and to fund your CPD.
If you wish to study for a certificate, the practice will give you all the support it can. For people who graduated two years ago or more, we pay the whole cost of studying for a certificate once you have passed your probationary period in the practice, providing you are willing to commit to remaining working with us for the period of study. We also give additional CPD time to all certificate candidates so studying for a certificate does not have to eat into your holiday periods.
It doesn’t often happen that experienced colleagues change jobs, but now and again life turns out differently to how you planned it and you have to move on.
As with less experienced colleagues in 2) above, we would look very carefully at what you could offer us and what we could offer you. For example, someone who could walk straight into complex surgery without supervision would be a great asset to us, but what would you want from us? Hopefully, less stress than you may have had before!
Interested? Excellent. To find out more, may we suggest that you return to the Home Page and then go to, firstly, About Us, then Vet Services, and finally Our Veterinary Staff. Still interested? Even better. Please send us your CV and contact details. One of our vets will contact you and you will be able to chat about the job and ask any questions you may have. If we are both happy, we look forward to meeting you at interview.
For anyone thinking of joining our nursing team, we have a nursing structure which could accommodate you whether you are a brand new student anxious to learn veterinary nursing basics ‘on the job’ before going to college, a university student in need of a placement or an experienced Registered Veterinary Nurse with professional ambitions which we could help you to fulfil.
We have more than twenty registered and student veterinary nurses working in the practice and we value veterinary nursing skills very highly.
All our nurses perform all lab investigations (blood sampling, spectrophotometry, preparing blood smears, urinalysis including dry preparations), all radiography, electrocardiography, in-patient medical nursing, including of those needing intensive nursing case such as spinal patients, and a variety of nurse consultations (e.g. puppy health checks, second vaccinations, routine re-injection consultations, post surgical check ups, dietary and behavioural advice).
Where possible, we encourage our veterinary nurses to perform Schedule 3 surgical procedures. This makes full use of nurse training and allows veterinary surgeons to concentrate on interpreting data rather than having to personally perform all the routine investigative procedures themselves.
We work a really lovely, amazingly relaxed one in 22 weekends (Saturday and Sunday daytime shifts) and one in 22 Saturdays (so very little weekend working at all).
There is no night working for RVNs unless they ask to be included in the night shift rota. This is optional but is approximately a one in 15 nightshift with an additional 12 hours pay and the following week off in lieu.
We work a 4-day week with one day off per week. There is additional time off for every weekend and Saturday worked and 30 days holiday per year including Bank Holidays where an RVN is not scheduled to work. Our Bank Holiday rota is such that each RVN works around one Bank Holiday about every three years.
RVNs here progress with their careers by taking on additional responsibilities. These are roles such as:
We are about to expand into a new building so additional area roles will be on offer at that stage.
There are always students in need of support. We do proper clinical coaching here with every student receiving the appropriate in-work guided learning and study time and an hour a week to sit down with their clinical coach and make a proper plan of progress. We are always very happy to see a new RVN train to take on a role as a clinical coach.
e.g., physiotherapy qualifications are something which we would really like people to progress with at the moment.
Once an RVN has completed the probationary period, for each new area of responsibility an RVN takes on, we pay an additional £1,000p.a. when they agree to learn the role and then another £1,000p.a. when they show that they can perform it successfully and it becomes a permanent part of their contract.
We are very happy to mentor and fund any RVN who wishes to study for additional qualifications ranging from a Nursing Diploma to a Physiotherapy or Hydrotherapy qualification. All veterinary nurses get 2 days’ paid CPD per year which is generously funded. In addition, we also train veterinary nurses who are interested in advancing their knowledge of the use of MRI and CT once they have demonstrated a commitment to the practice by working for us for more than two years.
The practice has around 40 years’ experience training student veterinary nurses, our own as well as university students on work placements, to complete their Nursing Skills records which are essential to qualifying as a Registered Veterinary Nurse. We have several experienced clinical coaches along with other RVNs and vets who are very happy to help train you. Our nursing pass rate is very close to 100% including in the practical examinations which are the most scary part of any student’s route to qualifying as a Registered Veterinary Nurse.
To apply to train as a student veterinary nurse you will need to have at least five GCSEs at Grades A-C (5-9) which must include English Language, Maths and at least one science subject. However, other academic qualifications may be accepted. It is also useful if you have done some work experience at a vet practice so that you understand the role before applying for a student nurse placement.
Our student nurses work alongside the rest of the veterinary team both in the daytime and, occasionally, for night shifts. This provides the patient care and emergency experience which is essential to becoming excellent veterinary nurses. When on a night shift, there is fully-furnished bedsit accommodation above the main surgery reserved for use by the on-duty nurse.
Student nurses who come from a long distance away to train with us can choose to live in bedsit accommodation provided by the practice, if they need to do so in order to take up a training role. If used full-time, the bedsits are completely rent- and rates-free, but you do pay a contribution towards the cost of the accommodation (gas, electricity and water bills). There are several kitchens and bathrooms, as well as a communal sitting and dining area with free TV.
All our students work for a year to gain the practical skills required before joining the university block release course at the University of Preston (Myerscough College) to train as Registered Veterinary Nurses. During that year, if they have not already completed an Animal Nursing Auxiliary course, every student is expected to successfully complete this as it is an excellent introduction to college work.
If you have a genuine interest in veterinary nursing (or veterinary medicine) as a career we will usually try to offer time at our main Grimsby branch to enable you to work out if this is the right job for you. If you would like to apply for work experience, you need to be fourteen years old or more. To apply, you need to send us a c.v. telling us who you are, what your career ambition is and what school qualifications you are aiming to achieve. It is a good idea to include dates when you would be free to do work experience. Please send applications to admin@abbeyvetcentregrimsby.co.uk and we will see whether we can help.
Whether you are recently qualified or have more clinical experience, our practice offers an interesting career with considerable professional satisfaction and appropriate levels of support to expand your knowledge and skills. Please read the information above then contact us to take your application further.
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