Business Development Centre

Veterinary Technician Online CE Courses

Accredited by the Alberta Veterinary Medical Association (ABVMA)

Earn continuing education unit (CEU) credits with online courses accredited by the Alberta Veterinary Medical Association (ABVMA). Choose from six available courses, each with quizzes to assess your understanding. Assessments are completed online, giving you the flexibility to progress at your own pace. The courses include digital study materials and the assessments. Detailed course descriptions are available at the bottom of this page.

Upon successful completion of the course, you will receive a digital Certificate of Completion, providing your CEU credits and official recognition of your achievement.

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Course Fee

• $299.45 (fee includes HST)

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Register

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Course Descriptions

Medical Emergencies

24 CEU credits

Better prepare yourself for the management of medical emergencies as a veterinary technician. When an emergency arrives at a small animal hospital, prompt and efficient treatment is of the utmost importance. If the veterinarian is not immediately available, the veterinary technician is the staff member called upon to assess the animal and decide if there is a true emergency requiring immediate treatment. Once the animal has been admitted to the clinic, the veterinary technician plays a key role in obtaining a history, carrying out the treatments authorized by the veterinarian, performing diagnostic procedures, and providing continuing nursing care.

Whatever the technician's situation in practice, whether working in a small animal hospital, mixed practice, or emergency clinic, we hope that this course will help prepare him or her to recognize and effectively respond to emergency situations in small animal practice. It is stressed throughout this course that the role of the technician in emergency response is determined by the individual veterinarian who supervises the technician and that all procedures MUST be discussed with the veterinarian and done under his or her supervision if the situation allows.

Not all medical emergencies are covered in this book. We have included only those that occur with reasonable frequency and which we feel the technician should be able to recognize and treat. Some medical emergencies, such as acute Addisonian crisis, ruptured spleen, ruptured bladder, acute glaucoma, etc... are not easily recognized without diagnostic procedures that are beyond the scope of this book. The technician who seeks further information on these and other conditions is referred to texts such as the Handbook of Veterinary Procedures and Emergency Treatment (7th Edition, Kirk, Bistner, and Ford, W.B. Saunders, 2000) and the Veterinary Emergency and Critical Care Manual (Karol A. Mathews, Lifelearn, 1996).

The material in this course is current as of April 2005. The reader should be aware that emergency medicine is an extremely dynamic area and that new treatment, procedures, monitoring devices, and drugs are constantly being introduced. It is important to periodically supplement this material with up-to-date information from technical journals, conferences, and textbooks

Advanced Anesthesia and Surgical Pain Management Techniques

24 CEU credits

Learn about how to effectively prevent and alleviate surgical pain, and provide the safest and most effective anesthesia possible for the various patient situations.  As with many other aspects of veterinary practice in Canada, anesthesia delivery is changing. The change reflects new scientific data as well as evolving attitudes of the general public and practitioners toward animal pain. Additional drivers of change include the more frequent need to deliver anesthesia to fragile or elderly animals along with the public’s awareness about anesthesia safety.

This course’s goal is to help the experienced technician 1) keep abreast of the evolution in our current understanding about what constitutes safe, effective anesthesia and peri-operative analgesia and 2) deliver the safest and most consistently effective anesthesia and surgical pain control to patients. Course content emphasizes the crucial skills of the technician in securing and protecting the airway of the anesthetized animal, peri-operative patient support, monitoring and problems solving. Because our anesthesia toolbox continues to expand to make room for new drugs, the course also includes a section that reviews anesthesia drugs in order to assist the veterinary technician in identifying desirable as well as adverse responses to selected drug protocols.

Introduction to Small Animal Behaviour

30 CEU credits

Gain insight into canine and feline social and behavioural development. Animals behave in a certain manner based on their natural instincts. Many of these behaviours have been refined during the domestication of animals, and have become endearing traits of our cuddly pets. However, many other behaviours are very disturbing to owners and often result in the removal of the animal from the home. Behaviour is the pattern of actions observed in animals, which occurs either voluntarily or involuntarily, and is an extricable blend of inherited or species-specific and acquired or learned components. This means that animals have a genetic predisposition, as well as an environmental aspect, that causes them to react the way they do. As a veterinary technician, being aware of an animal’s social and behavioural development can give us an explanation of why an animal may behave a certain way. This can greatly impact how we train and teach our clients to train their pets.

Many pets are presented to our clinics due to behavioural problems. Once the veterinarian has determined that there are no underlying medical conditions causing this behaviour, we need to help the owner find solutions to their problem. Unfortunately, many of these problems could have been avoided with the proper understanding of animal development and training. Behavioural counselling should begin before problems arise and must continue through life. Once we understand the fundamentals, we can begin working with our clients early in their pet’s development and hopefully prevent some behavioural problems. Although we cannot guarantee behavioural problems will still not arise, we can help avoid some disturbing behaviours.

This course will give insight on small animal behaviour, however, it by no means, takes the place of veterinarian recommended treatment or a behaviourist’s in-depth knowledge. There is a plethora of research, journals, books, articles, etc., developed to explain animal behaviour, that can be utilized in counselling clients with pets who have behaviour problems. However, as a crucial member of the animal health care team, it is essential that we know where to begin and who to contact to receive the appropriate help.

Introduction to Small Animal Dentistry

30 CEU credits

What is your role in providing good dental care for canines and felines.  Veterinary dentistry is a growing and vital part of veterinary medicine. It is an important aspect in caring for our animals, as it improves the quality of life and may increase longevity. Periodontal disease is the most common infectious disease occurring in dogs and cats today. It affects at least 90% of dogs and 70% of cats over the age of 5 years (Hale, 1998). With these statistics, it is important to address dental health and be efficient at preventing and treating it. As a veterinary technician, you play a crucial role in dentistry. Although veterinary technicians cannot perform dental extractions (i.e. CVO Regulation 1093, technicians cannot perform any major surgery), the remainder of the dental procedure requires a knowledgeable technician. The technician is often responsible for scheduling the dental procedure and, therefore, being aware of the time needed (i.e. dental cleaning versus oral surgery), reviewing the patients file beforehand to ensure all preoperative plans are completed (i.e. antibiotics dispensed, radiographs, blood work and/or urinalysis, etc.), and reviewing any previous dental work that has been done.

Once the animal arrives at the clinic the technician may also be responsible for explaining the treatment plan and procedure to the owner, explaining the estimate and obtaining a signature and phone number, completing all required preoperative diagnostics, doing another preliminary exam (ex. skull type, initial oral exam, etc.) and preparing and setting up for the procedure (i.e. all equipment available and ready, medications prepared, etc.). The technician is also trained and skilled in dental procedures. The technician, together with the veterinarian, charts a detailed oral examination. Once the procedure is complete, the technician must recover the animal, clean the area and the instruments, and educate the client on the best possible home care for the particular individual.

A dental procedure can be quite involved, depending on the extent of treatment required, so it is beneficial to the animal for it to be completed correctly. Therefore, it is critical to be informed and knowledgeable about all aspects of veterinary dentistry, as a veterinary technician plays a vital role

Canine and Feline Nutrition

30 CEU credits

This course is designed to provide an understanding of what nutrition is and how dogs and cats require and utilize specific nutrients. Marketing of pet foods is highly competitive and aggressive these days with trends mimicking those in human nutrition-grain free, corn free, gluten free, all natural, no preservatives, organic, just to name a few. In addition, the market caters to the human animal bond and confuses the consumer more with kibble in shapes of hearts or cuts of meat or colors mimicking the color of the foods a human would eat. For an owner who wants the very best nutrition for their pet, this can be very confusing. In addition, a wide variety of ingredients is available for manufacturing-nutrient content and quality of foods is highly variable. Some companies have “fixed” formulations with a stable nutrient profile from batch to batch or can to can; other manufacturers frequently substitute one ingredient for another based on cost, the so called “open” formulation.

We need to remember dogs and cats are not equivalent to humans anatomically or in nutrient requirements and, in addition, cats are not small dogs and the species need to be differentiated with regard to nutritional requirements. Given all of the choices, all of the marketing, and limited regulation of pet food in Canada, how is a consumer to make the “best” choice for their individual pet? This is where you come in and this is the purpose of this training document. We need to understand what nutrition is and how dogs and cats require and utilize specific nutrients. Nutrition is a science, one that has developed tremendously in the last couple of decades with an abundance of literature now available on feeding companion animals.

Pharmacology

30 CEU credits

Gain an understanding of the various drugs available in veterinary medicine, how they work, and what they are used for. The large number of drugs used in agriculture and veterinary medicine places significant responsibility on all those involved. Farmers demand and deserve the most efficient treatment of their stock; consumers demand and deserve meat, milk and eggs that are free of drug residues; and pet owners are becoming increasingly aware of problems that can develop in their companion animals if drugs are not used in a safe and conscientious manner. Therefore, the correct and safe se lection, handling and administration of veterinary drugs can ensure the humane treatment of the creatures in our care, as well as our own health and safety and that of our clients in the workplace.

This course will help you gain some understanding of the various drugs available in veterinary medicine, how they work, and what they are used for. The course restricts itself to drugs used for the treatment of domestic animals, food producing animals and poultry. Most of the drugs that are referred to in this manual have been developed and licensed by federal regulatory bodies for use in animals. However some drugs developed and licensed for humans, called human -label products, can be used in veterinary medicine upon prescription by a veterinarian. This is known as extra -label use, and the decision to use such a product in such a manner is the responsibility of the veterinarian and should be under the veterinarian’s supervision. You will find a few drugs with extra -label uses mentioned in this course.

Many drugs act by affecting the normal function or physiology of various body tissues or organs, so reference is made within this course to physiology and to some anatomy. As well, due to the large number of drugs available for use in veterinary medicine, only those most commonly used, in the opinions of the author, advisors and technical reviewers, have been included . Trade names are not provided, as they may differ in different regions. For a detailed description of all animal health products, please refer to the current edition of the Compendium of Veterinary Products and current veterinary drug manuals. Every effort was made to ensure the information contained in this course was current and accurate at the time of writing.