A typical day in the life of a Vet Nurse

By Scott Lackenby | Dated February 29, 2016

Hi, my name is Angela, I am one of the senior surgical nurses here at Gordon Vet. You will not have seen much of me as I spend most of my time in the hospital caring for our injured and sick patients and assisting the vets in the surgeries.

A typical day starts at 7am. The patients having surgery that day start to arrive. After the receptionist has admitted them, they come through to the hospital to see me. After a pat or a cuddle to help them feel at ease (no treats when they are having a general anaesthetic), the surgical vet I will do a physical examination and check their vitals; temperature, heart rate and respiratory rate. We also often do a pre- anaesthetic blood test to ensure that they are well enough for the anaesthetic.

In between getting the patients ready for the day’s surgery, the vet and I also do the morning rounds for all the patients who have stayed in the hospital over night. We check them, give them any medications they require and make sure they are happy, comfortable, have clean bedding and litter trays and have fresh water and food.
Once all the patients are happy and settled, the surgical vet and I can get started with the surgeries.

These surgeries can range from routine procedures such as cat/dog desexing, dentistry, cat abscess, lumpectomies, radiographs, and ultrasounds to major surgeries such as cruciate repairs and complicated orthopaedic surgery to life saving emergency surgery such as splenectomies and exploratory laparotomies. These are quite common and we retrieve all manner of items from dog’s intestines, such as socks, undies, tea towels, toys, rocks, fish on a hook, hair ties, and many more crazy things. There is never a dull moment!

Now, back to preparing patients for surgery. Once they have had their check up and blood test, we give our patients a sedative to help them feel relaxed both before and after their anaesthetic. This includes a painkiller as well. Once they are feeling sleepy, we place the dogs and cats on a drip, and give them their anaesthetic and any other medication that they might require, via their drip. Nobody needs any more needles than they absolutely have to have!

We a very lucky here at GVH, we have great medical equipment that we use to monitor the patients during surgery, which includes; heart rate, respiratory rate, blood oxygenation levels, carbon dioxide in the air that they breathe out, temperature and blood pressure, all of which we record on an anaesthetic chart. Once they are nice and stable, we can start to clip the surgical area and scrub it with what we call a surgical scrub which aseptically cleans the area. The patient is always my first priority, though I do also need to help the vet get “dressed”, which includes tying up their sterile gown, and opening sterile packs of gloves and all the surgical equipment that they require.

When surgery is completed, I clean the surgery area, turn off the anaesthetic and observe the patient while they wake. During their anaesthetic they are placed on a heated surgery table and have a cocoon of warm air flowing around them. This warmth doesn’t change when they move into recovery, where they are placed on a heated bed, and are watched closely until they can sit up.

We do surgery all morning, generally till about 2pm. Once we have finished all surgery for the day we then need to clean the instruments, gowns and surgery room/s. The instruments and gowns also need to be sterilized ready for the next day.

I really enjoy being a part of all these different surgeries, and enjoy helping patients get better whether by surgery, a drip or medication, and giving lots of cuddles and love and care. Being a vet nurse gives myself and all the other nurses I work with real satisfaction and enjoyment. We love watching them go home, with a big smile on their faces and their owners too.