Veterinary License Defense

In a survey conducted some years ago, complaints made to veterinary medical boards was cited as the most stressful event in veterinary practice. There is no doubt that receipt of a notification from a veterinary board is an intensely stressful and life-changing event for most veterinarians. We have seen too many veterinarians facing board action go into depression, suicide or leave the profession. Board actions place the right to practice in jeopardy and challenge your very existence as a veterinarian. When a board action goes bad, the consequences can be devastating for the veterinarian.

All too often, we are approached by veterinarians who are not VDA members for help as they are soon to face an administrative hearing or trial, or face the prospect of signing a board consent agreement that changes their lives - or who have already had their licenses suspended or revoked. These are often veterinarians who paid for license defense insurance cover, had a good case and ought to have been exonerated, but have been the victims of incompetent attorneys appointed by their insurance company to defend them. As much as we would like to help them, their case has been so badly presented and the damage so extensive that there is little we can do for them.

The effective management of license defense starts with THE EFFECTIVE MANAGEMENT OF INCIDENTS. If the incident was not effectively managed in the first place, then the chances of a successful later defense of your license are diminished. If you made an error at the time of the incident, the time to fix the error (and/or compensate the owner) is at that time. Veterinarians who do not pay proper attention to owner grievances at the time may not be able to recover from a challenge to their license.

The next step in the effective management of license defense is to take advantage of the VDA’s extensive experience in investigating cases and formulating responses to the owner’s complaints. Veterinarians are not lawyers and most lawyers are not competent to formulate responses for veterinarians. It takes much more than just hiring an attorney. Would you, knowing nothing about law, write a response on behalf of an attorney to the State Attorney’s board? Then surely it would be absurd for you to rely on an attorney, who knows nothing about veterinary medicine, to write your response to your state veterinary medical board.

The VDA provides a full service Veterinary Board defense program, including compiling the member’s defense theme and responses to the allegations, as well as all correspondence with the board, and arranges expert witnesses and legal representation for hearings and trials.