Becoming a Veterinarian

Before applying to veterinary college/school, future veterinarians must successfully complete university level pre-veterinary undergraduate course work that usually takes four years and a bachelor’s degree. Each college or school of veterinary medicine establishes its own pre-veterinary requirements, but typically these include demonstrating basic language and communication skills, and completion of courses in the social sciences, humanities, mathematics, biology, chemistry, and physics.

Admission to veterinary school is highly competitive with the number of qualified applicants admitted to veterinary schools varying from year to year. There are more than eight applications for each of the approximately 2,600 slots available each year. 

There are presently 28 AVMA Council on Education accredited colleges/schools of veterinary medicine in the United States, four in Canada, and eight in other countries. Each school is regularly evaluated by the AVMA Council on Education, which accredits these schools.

 After completing the required veterinary medical curriculum (usually over a period of four years), about 1 in 10 graduates chooses to pursue additional education in one of 20 AVMA-recognized veterinary specialties (surgery, internal medicine, animal behavior, dentistry, ophthalmology, pathology, laboratory animal medicine, preventive medicine, etc.). As much as 40 percent of veterinarians complete additional, post-graduate training in residencies, internships, and the pursuit of other advanced degrees like PhD’s or masters degrees in Public Health.

 Specialization is NOT required to be a veterinarian. Your regular doctor/family physician may diagnose your broken leg, but he or she will often refer you to an orthopedic specialist to have it fixed.  That is similar to specializing in one of the veterinary medicine specialty fields; a general veterinarian may see a difficult case, and refer it to a specialist.

 In general, someone that wants to specialize will do a one-year internship after veterinary school.  Internships can be at veterinary schools or in veterinary practices, and they are like an extra year of education with added responsibilities.  Some people will do an internship to gain extra experience and confidence before they go into a regular veterinary practice, and others will do an internship and then a residency to become specialized.

 A residency is a 2-3 year program of intensive training in a certain specialty.  Many residents are also enrolled in graduate school, and will get a Master’s degree or PhD at the same time. as their residency.  Once the residency is done, there is another exam that has to be passed to be considered a specialist.

 Employment opportunities for veterinarians are expected to continue well into the future.