Veterinary Wellbeing

While you’re busy taking care of your clients, don’t forget to take care of yourself.

Studies

At @Merck Animal Health, we believe that animal health and veterinary wellbeing are interdependent. That’s why we remain deeply committed to ensuring that the veterinary profession is equipped with the tools and resources it needs to continue to produce a robust pipeline of veterinary professionals for years to come.

To make progress in this space, we collaborated with the American Veterinary Medical Association (AVMA) to conduct four veterinary wellbeing studies in recent years. The findings from these studies have unveiled critical insights into the pressing issues veterinarians encounter, from emotional burnout to financial strains. These insights serve as our North Star guiding our initiatives, ensuring we focus on what truly matters to veterinary professionals.

Based on our study insights, we are concentrating on the needs of early career veterinarians and veterinary teams, such as technicians and practice leaders, as these groups are instrumental in shaping the future of our profession.

MentorVet
To offer support for early career veterinarians, we have extended our MentorVet program offerings to technicians via Mentor Vet Tech. Founded by @Addie Reinhard, MentorVet creates programs leveraging evidence-based approaches to empower veterinary professionals while helping to transform veterinary medicine. We’re also creating videos packed with veterinary wellbeing tips that feature Dr. Reinhard for professionals to tap into for additional support as needed. Check out MentorVet.net for more information.

Wellbeing Collective
In 2025, Merck Animal Health launched the Veterinary Wellbeing Collective. The goal of the Veterinary Wellbeing Collective is to strengthen the veterinary community by improving the communication and collaboration between key veterinary wellbeing organizations and to develop a sustainable plan for ongoing engagement between organizations.

LegUp
Along with these commitments, we are excited about our LegUp Program aimed at supporting the equine community. This initiative, which was started and led by our very own @Dr. Cara Wright and @Booth Farwell, is designed to provide resources and support to those working in equine veterinary practice, addressing unique challenges and promoting overall wellbeing. You can learn more about our LegUp Program here.

Merck Animal Health is committed to the veterinary profession and proud of our role in conducting this landmark study in collaboration with the American Veterinary Medical Association (AVMA). We hope to help the AVMA bring critical awareness and solutions to this important matter to better meet veterinarians’ needs.

Watch Videos on Research and Findings

2024 Veterinary Wellbeing JAVMA Publications

Press Release for 2024 Study

2023 Merck Animal Health Veterinary Wellbeing Study IV

Description

Merck Animal Health released findings of its fourth comprehensive veterinary wellbeing study in partnership with the American Veterinary Medical Association (AVMA) examining progress made in the areas of wellbeing and mental health of U.S. veterinarians since the company first launched its groundbreaking study in 2017. Conducted in the fall of 2023 and similar to previous benchmark studies (2017, 2019 and 2021), the goal of the fourth Veterinary Wellbeing Study was to identify and explore the state of veterinary professionals’ mental health, wellbeing and burnout in an effort to bring awareness to the challenges veterinarians and support teams face and more importantly, how they’re able to manage them with the support received from partners such as Merck Animal Health and AVMA. As a larger focus this year, the study took a deeper dive into veterinary team members – from veterinary technicians to office managers – with nearly five times more responses from these positions than the 2021 survey.

2023 Veterinarian Wellbeing 2023 Veterinarian Team Wellbeing

Other studies

Merck Animal Health
Veterinary Wellbeing Study III

Merck Animal Health released findings of its third comprehensive veterinary wellbeing study in partnership with the American Veterinary Medical Association (AVMA) examining the wellbeing and mental health of U.S. veterinarians. Conducted in the fall of 2021, it is the first since the COVID-19 pandemic began with a goal to examine and bring critical awareness to the challenges impacting the veterinary profession, while highlighting the impact the pandemic has had on practitioners and staff. For the first time, the study includes responses from veterinary technicians and support staff and their perspectives on the challenges they are currently facing at work.

Learn more

Merck Animal Health
Veterinary Wellbeing Study II

Merck Animal Health announced the results of a second comprehensive study of wellbeing and mental health among U.S. veterinarians. Conducted in collaboration with the American Veterinary Medical Association (AVMA), the study also examined job satisfaction, compensation, burnout, substance use disorder, cyberbullying and suicide among veterinarians while evaluating potential solutions.

Learn more

Inaugural 2017
Veterinary Wellbeing Study

A landmark study in the United States to explore mental health and wellbeing in the veterinary profession. A survey of practicing and nonpracticing veterinarians was conducted. The questionnaire and research protocol were submitted to the Chesapeake Institutional Review Board, Columbia, Md, for review and received a letter of exemption. For the survey, a random sample of 20,000 email addresses was obtained from the AVMA’s database of working US veterinarians. An email signed by AVMA president Dr. Michael Topper and executive vice president and CEO Dr. Janet Donlin was sent by the AVMA to alert recipients to the upcoming survey and encourage them to participate.

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Meet the authors

John Volk, BS

Senior Consultant Brakke Consulting

John Volk is the principal author of four landmark economic studies of the veterinary profession, has been widely published in veterinary journals and is a frequent speaker at veterinary conferences. He is a senior consultant with Brakke Consulting, the largest consulting firm serving the global animal health, veterinary and pet care markets.

Uli Schimmack,
BA, MA, PhD

Dr. Uli Schimmack is a professor in the psychology department at the University of Toronto, Mississauga. His research focuses on the scientific understanding of happiness with the ultimate goal of developing a causal theory that can be used to predict the impact of personal and societal changes on subjective wellbeing or happiness.

Elizabeth Strand, PhD, MSSW, LCSW

Dr. Elizabeth Strand is the founding director of Veterinary Social Work (VSW) at the University of Tennessee College of Veterinary Medicine. She is a licensed clinical social worker, family therapist, mediator and grief counselor. Her areas of interest include the development of veterinary social work as a sub-specialty of social work practice.

Joseph Hahn, DVM

Merck Animal Health

Dr. Joseph Hahn is Executive Director of US Companion Animal and Equine Professional Services. In his current role, he has been a champion for the enrichment of the veterinary profession helping to sponsor and advance initiatives from the AVMA, Not One More Vet, the Veterinary Hospital Managers Association, MentorVet and others.

Addie Reinhard,
DVM, MS

MentorVet

Dr. Addie Reinhard is the Founder and CEO of MentorVet, an evidence-based mentorship and professional development program that promotes early career wellbeing. A veterinary wellbeing researcher, her research interests include developing and evaluating innovative interventions to support mental health and wellbeing within the veterinary profession.

Kate Stiefelmeyer, MASc.

Vice President, Kynetec

Kate has extensive experience working with clients in the food and animal health sectors to better understand their consumers and clients’ needs and preferences. Kate utilizes both quantitative and qualitative methodologies to understand pricing, consumer behavior, advertising preferences and more. She is based in Guelph, Ontario.

Kevin Probyn-Smith,
M.Sc.

Senior Data Analyst, Kynetec

With a background in agricultural economics, Kevin works in Data & Marketing Sciences at Kynetec and focuses on modelling and statistics related to agriculture and animal health. Kevin is based in Guelph, Ontario.

The Collective

The Veterinary Wellbeing Collective hosting its first meeting in July 2025, where mental health and wellbeing professionals engaged in actionable discussions about the past, present and future of veterinary wellbeing. A paper outlining the key takeaways and future direction of the Wellbeing Collective meeting is currently in development and will be shared later this year.

Videos

New Veterinary Wellbeing Research: How to reduce stress and avoid burnout

New findings and discussion topics for reducing stress and burnout in the veterinary profession.
This video is for veterinary professionals. Clicking the link will take you to Brainshark to log and watch.

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Veterinary Team Wellbeing Research: Creating a happier, more energized veterinary team

New findings on veterinary wellbeing study led by Dr.’s Greene, Volk and Reinhardt.
This video is for veterinary professionals. Clicking the link will take you to Brainshark to log and watch.

See details

Materials & Publications

2024 JAVMA Veterinary Team Wellbeing Study

Volk, Schimmack, Strand, Reinhard, Hahn, Andrews, Probyn-Smith, Jones

View on AVMA.ORG

2024 JAVMA Veterinary Wellbeing Study

Volk, Schimmack, Strand, Reinhard, Hahn, Andrews, Probyn-Smith, Jones

View on AVMA.ORG

Healthy Strategies for You and Your Practice

A print-friendly guide filled with ideas for you and your practice.

Download

Merck Animal Health Thank You Card

At Merck Animal Health, we recognize how important it is for veterinary healthcare teams to prioritize their mental health. Whether you are a pet parent or animal health professional, we encourage you to #PawsToAppreciate someone working in veterinary medicine and show your support and appreciation for what they do!

Download Thank You Card