[00:00:06] Welcome to All Cats Considered, a new podcast from the American Association of Feline Practitioners, where we interview professionals from across the veterinary world and take deep dives into the latest evidence-based research developments, studies, and guidelines that improve feline health and well being. My name is Dr. Kira Ramdas, President of the AAFP, and I'm proud to introduce this new podcast. We are the home for veterinary professionals seeking to improve the care of cats through high standards of practice, continuing education, and evidence-based medicine. In each podcast, you will hear interviews from a variety of experts throughout our field covering a wide range of topics and recent developments in the practice of feline health, sharing the key points you need to know to improve your patient's care. Let's dive in and take a listen with this week's experts.
[00:01:01] Dr. Cathy Lund: Hi, I'm Dr. Cathy Lund and I'm here today with the amazing Dr. Elizabeth Collaran. She's a consultant, an educator, and probably most significantly, a real advocate for the cat. We're going to talk about Cat Friendly teams. And Elizabeth, one of the things you've said that really has stayed with me is how you have seen that one of the casualties of the pandemic of COVID has been with the workforce morale resiliency. Could you elaborate on that a little bit?
[00:01:37] Dr. Elizabeth Colleran: Yeah, I think to me it feels like a psychological virus where if a couple of people start feeling down and start getting critical of their environment and all that and start complaining about the boss and then everybody else hears that and says, oh, I work for the same guy, so I must be depressed too. And I think it spreads. And I think we're at a place now where we have to re-center ourselves, reestablish our principal goals about compassionate care and refire our passion for that, because I think that's what it takes to get us all out of it. I think we need to just back up and say, what are we doing here? This is a fabulous profession, we have an amazing job to do, we have wonderful clients and a great team. Let's refocus on that and not so much on all these other things that have made us crazy since COVID Can.
[00:02:34] Dr. Cathy Lund: Does Cat friendly give us a path to getting there?
[00:02:39] Dr. Elizabeth Colleran: I think it can. General practice, whatever kind of practice because of the certification program.
So if I'm trying to reenergize my team, then maybe I'm going to say, hey, take this Cat Friendly Practice certification and see how much you can learn and then see how much you can bring back to the group and inspire them to do it themselves. So kind of it took one person to start this process of going downhill. I think it also takes one person to bring us all back together and refocus on our passion.
[00:03:11] Dr. Cathy Lund: Teams have to work together, right?
We've got this epidemic, as you were saying, and we've got burnout. That's all anyone's talking about in the profession right now, Cat Friendly Guidelines and just the overall practice of implementing a Cat Friendly workplace can help, right?
[00:03:34] Dr. Elizabeth Colleran: I think it can, because I think it can refocus us all on what we're here for. What are we doing, what do we care about what's important to us, how we landed in this profession at all? And it gets us back to that feeling of doing really important work that makes all the other stuff, I think, float away.
[00:03:52] Dr. Cathy Lund: And when cats are happier and more comfortable in their setting, I think in my office anyway, my staff behave accordingly.
They do a better job. They're more fulfilled when they're not trying to get a cat to do things that maybe he or she is reluctant to do.
[00:04:13] Dr. Elizabeth Colleran: When you can get the work done without creating a stressed out, freaked out, frightened cat, there's a moment of absolute pride. And that kind of pride is as infectious as burnout. If we all came together to refocus on the things that we do best, then I think that that kind of energy is really what we can do to get through this.
[00:04:34] Dr. Cathy Lund: And that trickles down to the cat caregivers. The people who are walking through our doors, they see a really good encounter, right? A happy team, a happy cat, and they're going to come back for seconds.
[00:04:47] Dr. Elizabeth Colleran: They are. And the other thing is that one of the things that's happening too, is everybody's been affected by COVID and people have spent two years with nobody to talk to. So one of the most important things we need to do now with our caregivers is let them be heard.
And they will be back over and over again if we demonstrate that level of compassion for them that we have for their cats.
[00:05:11] Dr. Cathy Lund: Yeah, it's an important lesson. I think the pandemic has taken so many things away from us, our sense of shared purpose. But that beautiful thing you said about cooperation and morale and how we have a profession that matters, just being able to say that to the people in.
[00:05:32] Dr. Elizabeth Colleran: A workplace and it's getting the team back into that mindset, reenergizing, refocusing is all part of what the Cat Friendly Practice is all about. It's about the passion that we bring to our profession and what we can do with it to make life better for cats. The other part of it is too, is cats pick up on this, right? They are the most intuitive creatures. So if we're kind of having a rough day or bummed out or whatever, they pick up on that, and I think their fear level goes up or their anxiety level increases just because they sense that things aren't right in the world.
[00:06:09] Dr. Cathy Lund: Absolutely. I see that in my workplace. And we really do need to find an individual in our practice who can be that advocate for cats, for cat friendly.
[00:06:23] Dr. Elizabeth Colleran: I agree. But that person doesn't do all of the work that person, guides other people, reinforces, tells them what a great job they're doing, reviews where we are from one step to the next. Their job is really to keep the ball moving, not to do all the right.
[00:06:41] Dr. Cathy Lund: Right? So together we can move the needle and we can make a better world for cats.
[00:06:47] Dr. Elizabeth Colleran: We absolutely can. No doubt about it.
[00:06:50] Dr. Cathy Lund: Thank you very much, Dr. Collarin.
[00:06:52] Dr. Elizabeth Colleran: Been fun. Thanks for inviting me.
[00:06:54] Thank you for listening to this episode of All Cats Considered. We hope you enjoyed this interview. For more information on the topics discussed during the episode, please be sure to head over to Catvets.com and explore the links in the podcast description. And please be sure to subscribe to this podcast in your platform of choice so that you don't miss any episodes as we release them. Have thoughts or ideas about the interview you heard today? Share them with us. Leave us a comment on our Facebook page, or shoot us an email at
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