A West Country animal hospital is now helping train specialists of the future after being approved to run its own small animal internal medicine veterinary residency programmes.
The go-ahead from the European College of Veterinary Internal Medicine (ECVIM) is a significant endorsement for Linnaeus-owned Cave Veterinary Specialists in West Buckland, Somerset.
The practice has moved swiftly to appoint vets Sara Cermeno Fernandez and Lucy Venman as its first residents, who began their programmes last month after completing successful internships.
Both Sara and Lucy joined Cave in 2019 with the aim of pursuing a medicine specialisation.
Cave’s clinical director Nele Van den Steen, an RCVS and European specialist in internal medicine, said: “We are naturally very pleased to have achieved this milestone and are delighted to get started, with our first residents Sara and Lucy continuing their career development with us.
“To be approved for a residency programme, you have to show you can support the caseload required and provide the training which the residents will need.
“So, this accreditation shows we have the integrity and the capacity to support the programme, which is a notable achievement and a ringing endorsement of our work here at Cave.”
Cave is one of the leading referral centres in the South West and offers comprehensive, specialist-led services in anaesthesia, cardiology, dermatology, internal medicine, neurology and neurosurgery, oncology, orthopaedic surgery, pain management and rehabilitation and soft tissue surgery.
For more information on Cave Veterinary Specialists, visit their website.
