18+ Pros And Cons Of Being A Veterinarian (Explained)

A veterinarian is a medical professional who provides animal treatment with veterinary medicine. They practice on animals by treating diseases, disorders, and managing reproductive health.

There are different types of veterinarians; some treat small animals, some with large farm animals, or some work with wild animals. They are being learned to work with every type of animal but work for certain groups of animals.

Advantages of Being a Veterinarian	Disadvantages of Being a Veterinarian
Veterinarians can earn pretty good money	Length of Study
One can work with pets	Difficulty Dealing with Pets
Veterinarians can make people happy	Emotionally Wearing
Veterinarians practice indoors	One struggle for maintaining work-life balance
Working as a veterinarian is not that stressful	One may be exposed to various injuries and disease

Advantages of Being a Veterinarian

Veterinarians can earn pretty good money

An advantage of being a veterinarian is that one makes good money from what they pursue. As per available online surveys, the average salary of a veterinarian at present is about USD 100,000 per annum.

The average salary is increasing year over year. Many veterinarians even make much more than this average salary.

Because of their good reputation, the demand for their services is high. Living in big metropolitan areas gives them the opportunity to charge higher fees.

Especially in posh areas, where several rich people reside, veterinarians may charge even higher. It is much more if compared to veterinarians living in rural areas where most people are not able to pay high fees for veterinary services.

One can work with pets

Being a veterinarian gives one the opportunity to work with pets all day long. Though some people simply do not like pets for personal reasons, many others like and keep them.

Therefore, if a person craves spending time with pets and assisting them to recover from diseases, working as a veterinarian is a great opportunity for them as they can pursue their passion for animals with their work and their work will not feel that much like a job but in turn like a hobby.

Veterinarians can make people happy

Like the other medical professionals who treat humans, being a veterinarian is a noble profession.

They will not only make the animals and pet keepers joyful by curing animals and treating them with serious illnesses and other ailments. For pet keepers, pets are very valuable. They are emotionally very much attached to their pets.

They are counted as part of the family and for persons who do not have kids and for elderly people.

Therefore, by treating the animals, one can make many people happy and many of them will even be obliged as veterinarians to save the lives of their animals.

Veterinarians practice indoors

An advantage of being a veterinarian is that they practice indoors and are protected against the extreme heat in summer and against the extreme cold in winter.

You also don’t have to work in the rain outside as a veterinarian. Though few people may not consider it as a privilege, most other people a construction worker has to be on a construction site, a garbage collector has to gather the garbage, a mailman has to be outdoors delivering mail.

It does matter if the weather is good as efficiency and life span increase significantly. One may sit in a comfortable work environment with indoor heating or air conditioning.

Working as a veterinarian is not that stressful

Another advantage a veterinarian has is working in a stress-free environment. They do have a busy time sometimes as they have to take care of several patients simultaneously.

But if one is good at their profession and has sufficient staff to take care of small things, they will usually have a pretty good time.

Therefore, if one is able to plan themselves smartly, they will be able to maintain a comparatively relaxed work atmosphere.

Disadvantages of Being a Veterinarian

Length of Study

The biggest disadvantage that a veterinarian faces is longer study time. If one desires to become a veterinarian, the program would be five to six years long.

One will be required to study veterinary sciences and animal husbandry. They do require having a background in science for a better understanding of the stream.

Veterinarians will need a master’s degree to excel in their careers. Though nowadays some universities do offer an integrated course which shortens the duration, still it is much more than any other courses.

Difficulty Dealing with Pets

Unlike a human, a pet does not understand that they are being treated. Due to pain and uneasiness as an agitated and angry pet can pose a challenge.

There can be a possibility of getting bitten, kicked or another kind of physical assault. Veterinarians need to be smart and have compassion.

It is very tough to handle animals in agony. One may have to make tough decisions. Hard decisions like applying euthanasia will have a psychological strain on veterinarians.

Emotionally Wearing

Like other medical professionals dealing with humans, a veterinarian has to be available throughout the clock and seven days a week or on-call during certain hours.

One will have to bear the psychological, physical, and emotional pressures of the work. As veterinarians are exposed to heart-wrenching situations and stress does take its toll emotionally.

Though it is not unique to veterinarians, compassion trauma is normal among those who profess this career option. Being human they do feel the pain the animal is going through. They do their best to treat the animals and if they are unable to save their life they feel down. One may imagine if a vet comes out of the operation theatre and has to inform the pet keeper about the operation not being successful.

One struggle for maintaining work life balance

As like with most medical professionals, a veterinarian has to treat pets during the day as and when there may be a case.

One may find themselves working for longer hours and being at their clinic even after their work shift has ended. It is worse if one is based in a small town that does not have a lot of veterinarians.

It may lead them in a cycle of finding it hard to balance their work and family time and they may end up getting burnt from stress and trauma by being overworked.

One may be exposed to various injuries and disease

As physically humans are different from pets. Continuous exposure to diseased animals, birds may expose veterinarians to diseases that infected animals or birds have. Kicks, bites, bruises, and scratches are routine injuries to veterinarians.

Unlike animals, they are not able to trust a vet whom they met for the first time. They also do not understand that they are trying to treat them and even act hostile towards the vet.

A lot of pain and discomfort will further deteriorate the condition. The diseases like Rabies, Psittacosis, and Blast mycosis are some of the diseases which are transmitted from animals to humans.