April Employee Spotlight Winner: Cameron Ruland

Cameron Ruland is one of our fabulous techs in San Diego. This past week he celebrated his 1 year anniversary with The Vets. Cameron originally went to school for screenwriting, but ended up wanting to work with animals instead. When he's not at work helping pets, he's hiking and scouting the brush for reptiles to snap photos of, primarily snakes. He loves cold-blooded animals just as much as warm-blooded ones! 

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When asked about a client experience where he felt he made the biggest impact, this is what he had to say: 

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"My doctor and I had a basic wellness exam on 2 recently domesticated feral cats. These cats were basically ghosts, you'd see them for a second and the next they would zip away, disappearing until we turned the entire house upside down again to find them. Examinations were not going to be possible; we were there for 45 minutes and neither the owner or us were even able to touch a cat.

We left the owner with mild sedatives so we could come back and try again. On our way out of the appointment there was a loud noise as the owner's cabinet rumbled and you could hear glass shaking. We were all very confused and it took us a minute to realize one of the cats was making the noise. This cat was stuck upside down inside a small crevasse between the wall and kitchen cabinets. We could hear the cat panting and urine began dripping from the cracks in the wood. The cat was dying of stress and suffocating but completely walled off from us.

Though this was a horrifying situation for everyone, it impacted me because the owner allowed me to tear her cabinets apart with hammers, wedges, and whatever she had to break through her wall and cabinets. No medicine was performed that appointment, but it gave me a great appreciation for the uncertainty of this job. And though the worst-case scenario happened, the owner trusted us to help her cat by any means, and that meant breaking apart an important part of her home.

It reminded me that often owners don't know what to do in certain situations and neither does the medical team, but part of our job is to bring the owner on as a team player when in their home to help with their pet. Medically, it was the least productive appointment I've ever had. But this job isn't just medicine, it's about collaborating with the DVM, the owners, and the pet(s) to create a unified team that does whatever they can for the patient."

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If you would like to be considered for our May Employee Spotlight Winner, all you have to do is answer one question related to your experience working here.