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Gender gap in animal health care
Philadelphia Inquirer

Gender gap in animal health care
"Men represent diversity," said one school's dean, as women are now
the large majority of veterinary students.
By Stacey Burling
Inquirer Staff Writer
Posted on Sun, Aug. 13, 2006

As a child, Deirdre Weissman was the kind of girl who'd try to mend a
bird's broken wing - precisely the kind of girl who becomes a
veterinarian.

Now, grown-up girls like her make up almost 80 percent of veterinary
students, a development that Joan Hendricks, Weissman's new dean at
the University of Pennsylvania, could not have imagined when she
applied to veterinary schools in 1974. A mere 17 percent of her
fellow students were female.

Within 30 years, the gender gap has reversed and the profession is
struggling to understand what that means. Among other things, it
raises questions about how women, who bear disproportionate
responsibility for child-rearing, will change the nature and
ownership of veterinary practices.

Deborah Kochevar, the new veterinary dean at Tufts University, where
86 percent of vet students are female, said the balance
had "definitely gotten out of alignment... . There's a sense that
balance is good and diversity is good and, at this point, men
represent diversity."

Hendricks, who last year became one of the country's first female vet-
school deans, is especially concerned that women have been too
reluctant to buy the private practices that have long characterized
her profession. She says that has aided the expansion of corporate
veterinary medicine. Some praise big veterinary corporations for
flexible working conditions and modern equipment. But Hendricks
worries that financial types could wrest control of medical decisions
from veterinarians and that could diminish care.

"It's time for women to begin taking ownership and... a leadership
role. I think we're at a crossroads," Hendricks said. "Either women
are going to lead the profession or it won't be led by vets."

She sees hope in students like Weissman, who leads Penn's chapter of
the Veterinary Business Management Association, a student-run group
founded at Penn in 2001 that now has 18 chapters. With her husband,
Weissman, 28, has started a Center City pet-sitting firm that has 800
clients and 35 sitters. More important, she wants to own her own
practice within five years of graduation.

The changes in veterinary medicine come as Americans are spending
more on their pets and are willing to pay for more advanced medical
treatment. The American Pet Products Manufacturers Association
estimates that Americans will spend $38.5 billion on pets this year,
including $9.4 billion for veterinary care.

Though privately owned animal hospitals still dominate, corporate
practices such as Banfield, the Pet Hospital, are growing. Banfield
has more than 500 hospitals, many in or beside PetSmart stores, and
is adding 80 a year. VCA Antech Inc., which buys traditional
practices, has more than 375 hospitals.

The corporations offer young veterinarians attractive working
conditions and the chance to worry only about medicine, industry
leaders say. They likely would expand anyway, but have benefited from
the larger pool of women.

Their growth "is fueled by the interest of people in one, not owning
a practice and two, being able to work" part time, said Bonnie
Beaver, a former president of the American Veterinary Medical
Association who teaches at Texas A&M University.

Why so few men enter veterinary medicine and how their absence is
affecting the field is a touchy subject. In 1970, only 10 percent of
veterinary students were female, according to the Association of
American Veterinary Medical Colleges. In 1972, the federal government
made discrimination based on sex illegal, Beaver said. The numbers of
women started climbing and kept going.

To some degree, this happened because the barriers to women
fell. "It's a profession of compassion, which is going to attract
women," Beaver said.

Some say women may also have been less concerned by veterinarians'
relatively low pay compared with medical professionals who treat
people. Veterinary deans say their students take the same kinds of
undergraduate classes as those who qualify for medical, dental or
pharmacy school, but people in those fields make more money later.
The average starting salary for private-practice vets, who study at
least four years after college, is now about $51,000.

Nearly 70 percent of new pharmacists are now female while only a
third of new dentists are. Medical students are about 50-50, but the
gender balance varies dramatically by specialty.

How the infusion of women is affecting veterinary practice is a
matter of intense debate and inadequate study. Some say the biggest
changes are generational. Younger vets of both sexes, they say, want
a better balance between work and home, and working 80 hours a week
as some older practice owners do is out of the question.

New vets also are more likely to marry professionals, ruling out some
rural practices because there is no place for the spouse to work.
And, these experts say, when retiring vets say no one wants to buy
their practice, it may be because the practice is not profitable
enough, not because women do not want to own a business. Plus,
students are graduating with more debt now - an average of $88,077 in
2005 - and that makes it harder to buy a practice.

On the other hand, studies show that female vets are more likely to
work part time than men, so practices often have to hire more people.
Even when they work the same hours or own practices, women, on
average, make less money. And, they are more satisfied with what they
are paid.

Several veterinary organizations have an initiative to raise pay and
say income has been rising in recent years.

Women do buy practices, but veterinary leaders say many are content
to work as employees, or associates, and that is a significant change
from earlier generations.

Cheryl Pfeffer, 38, is a Banfield partner veterinarian in Owasso,
Okla., who has three small children and works full time. She would
have to work and worry more if she owned a practice.

"You just cannot have a life," she said. "I don't want to wake up one
day and my kids are 18 and they say, 'Mom, I don't know who you
are.' "

Banfield is a compromise. "Women are realizing we can have it all. We
can have a career. We can have a family, and we can have a home, but
there has to be a balance," she said. "I think that corporate
medicine is offering us that balance."

Kim Taylor, 51, who owns a practice in Somers Point, N.J., and is
president of the New Jersey Veterinary Medical Association, says
owning gives veterinarians more control and more money - plus never-
ending responsibility. "When you own your own business, in a way, the
business owns you, especially where living creatures are involved,"
she said.

Meghan Stalker, a former Penn student now working as an intern in New
Jersey, presided over the Veterinary Business Management
Association's national expansion while at Penn. She was inspired by
her high school work in what she saw as a dysfunctional veterinary
practice. Without good business skills, she said, "you cannot
practice the best medicine and you cannot be the best doctor you can
be."

While many of her colleagues tell her they do not want to run a
business, she thinks it is important. But the high numbers of women,
coupled with increasing equipment, insurance and support-staff costs,
may require changes. "The traditional one-owner veterinary hospital
may not work for me, but I can work together with some other people
who feel the same way to come up with a novel business model," she
said.

Weissman, who doesn't have children yet, envisions a large practice -
10 to 15 vets - with several partners sharing financial risk and
responsibility. She thinks she will be a better wife and mother if
she is happy. "I'm very entrepreneurial at heart," she said.

Contact staff writer Stacey Burling at 215-854-4944 or
sburling@phillynews.com.

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