Veterinary professionals will have the opportunity to learn the most up-to-date and effective methods of pain management at the North American Veterinary Community’s (NAVC) Level Up: Pain Management Summit on Tuesday 16 August 2022. To register for the free virtual summit visit the website.
Chronic pain is ubiquitous in companion animals affecting 20 percent of dogs and 40 percent of cats. Pain decreases mobility and activity, and can even cause behaviour problems, including aggression. Proactive and preemptive pain management are critical to improve the animal’s quality of life.
“More than 45 million pets experience chronic or acute pain. Fortunately, there are methods and options for managing pain that are improving all the time, offering new ways to help our pets feel better,” said NAVC Chief Veterinary Officer Dana Varble, DVM, CAE.
“As we face more frequent medication shortages, it is also especially helpful for veterinary professionals to stay up-to-date on the wide variety of options for delivering effective multimodal pain management to patients, so they live longer and with a better quality of life.”
Led by renowned veterinary specialists, the Level Up: Pain Management summit sessions include:
- Maximising analgesic efficacy and safety in anaesthetised patients – Effective analgesia for the duration of pain is paramount to patient health, welfare and quality of life. In this session, Tamara Grubb, DVM, PhD, DACVAA, President-Elect IVAPM will discuss how to maximise analgesia in anaesthetised patients. Dr. Grubb will address the importance of multimodal analgesia in effective anaesthesia protocols, and how to best accomplish this by examining the pain pathway
- Looking at a local but thinking outside the blocks – Shauna Feldsher BS, CVT, CCFP, VTS (Anesthesia/Analgesia) will take a deeper look at lidocaine and the beneficial uses it has outside of locoregional anaesthesia
- Limiting opioid use: by force and choice – Veterinary professionals have been taught that opioids are the gold standard for moderate to severe pain. Now many practices are having to reconsider inventory, home prescriptions, and balancing best practices with safety. In this session, Stephen J. Cital RVT, SRA, RLAT, CVPP, VTS-LAM (Res. Anaesthesia) will discuss options for pain management less reliant on opioids and practical approaches for prescribing medications to go home
The Level Up: Pain Management summit hour-long sessions begin at 6pm EDT. Registered participants can receive up to three interactive continuing education hours.
The Level Up virtual series from the NAVC’s VirtualXP division launched in October 2021. Through VirtualXP, the NAVC provides a comprehensive portfolio of virtual learning and events customised to individual learning preferences. VirtualXP complements the NAVC’s industry-leading in-person events and includes interactive virtual summits, live webinars and the microlearning videos series VetFolio Bytes. All VirtualXP education is offered exclusively through the NAVC’s online learning platform, VetFolio.