High Street Vet Surgery - The Regional Clinic Performing Surgery That City Practices Refer Out - Dr Virginia Grice - ep.1005

Julie South [00:00:06]:
30 minute consults, advanced diagnostics and a team that wants to learn your gifts. This isn't your typical regional clinic. 

Hi, I'm Julie South and you're listening to Veterinary Voices, the podcast dedicated to growing the number of veterinary clinic employers of choice through showcasing those clinics that are doing it best and through empowering vet clinic employers to hire fast and right. 

Today, we're continuing our High Street Vet Surgery showcase, this time with Dr. Virginia Grice, a veterinarian with three decades of experience who has discovered something extraordinary about practising in Rockhampton. 

This is episode 1005, part of our special High Street Vet series, where we're going deep with this team. 

Virginia's now performing corneal surgery that saves eyes instead of removing them, work that's drawing referrals from across central Queensland. She's found a place where technology rivals city practises, where clients will go to the nth degree for their pets, and where the team genuinely wants to learn from each other's gifts, including yours.

Julie South [00:01:27]:
Because right now they're looking for their next small animal veterinarian to grow their team. 

If that sounds like you, I'll put the link in the show notes for you to find out more. We join the conversation here, where Virginia introduces herself and explains how a regional practise is became the place where her career truly flourished.

Virginia Grice [00:01:56]:
My name is Virginia Grice and I am a veterinarian here at High Street Vets in Rockhampton. 

This is now my fifth year here. I have worked in all different parts of Australia, three different states, but I always seem to get drawn to rural, remote and regional areas along with my family. That's what's brought me here.

Julie South [00:02:18]:
Does that mean that you are not a native of Rockhampton?

Virginia Grice [00:02:24]:
Very much so. I'm a native from New South Wales, moved to Western Australia and did a long stint there and then Rockhampton.

Julie South [00:02:35]:
Can you tell me, please, because you are new to, or you were at one point new to Rockhampton, what is it like moving to Rockhampton as an outsider? 

The reason I'm asking that question is because it's possible your next new vet could also be in a similar situation to that.

Virginia Grice [00:02:59]:
I think one of the most common questions that people ask when we moved here was, how do you like Rockhampton? And everybody in a country town wants you to like where you are. 

The reality is that often you miss your old setting very much. You've not always left it because you didn't enjoy it. 

There may be other reasons. I was always able to say with 100% honesty, there's so much to like about Rockhampton and so and that's true. It's a big regional centre. 

There is an abundance of sporting activities, social opportunities quite out quite besides what work offers in terms of friendships and things like that. So I think moving to Rockhampton was made easy because there is a lot to like about Rockhampton.

Julie South [00:03:51]:
Have you brought up a family here, Virginia?

Virginia Grice [00:03:53]:
We've brought up the tail end of a family. I am the mum of five adult kids. When we came to Rockhampton, three children Rock remained in WA. 

Covid had a lot to do with that decision as it did for many families. So we had to make a hard decision that our family actually split at that point and we bought our two youngest children who were still in high school across here. 

So I feel like I haven't raised little children here but I've been heavily involved in our high school age, you know, that last stage of looking after them at home.

Julie South [00:04:31]:
How would you describe your clients?

Virginia Grice [00:04:33]:
The clients at High Street are people that are very willing to go a long way with diagnoses treatment. 

As I said, I've worked in all different places that have different socioeconomic profile and often it's quite clear to both client and ourselves and probably even the patient what's wrong. 

However, they don't have the financial means to follow through with involved treatment. 

The clients at High street often will go to the nth degree. 

That's something that's a standout here which as a veterinarian means that you can probe things quite a long way because of the motivation and the means of the clients. 

I find it's quite a mixture. 

However, it probably does move slightly more towards the higher socioeconomic side of things. 

That's by no means means uniform but compared with other places I've worked I have noticed that here you also have.

Julie South [00:05:36]:
30 minute consults which is pretty unheard of in many, many clinics. How is that as a veterinarian for you to work with a 30 minute consult?

Virginia Grice [00:05:49]:
I love 30 minute consults.

 I think I like to try and get to a diagnosis or a plan that's agreeable to the client and to us quite quickly and I think a 30 minute consult is key to do that. 

Otherwise what tends to happen is the history is truncated. 

There's kind of a pressure to do a try and try this and see if it works approach and I think in the end it means there's a circularity to diagnosis and you possibly are spending more of your clients time and money working out what has actually happened. 30 minute consults to me, set the most beautiful baseline and give you an opportunity to examine the animal properly, you know, develop a friendship and a relationship with the client. 

Listen carefully. Like, listen, listen. They always know their own pet best.

Virginia Grice [00:06:46]:
They notice the smallest things are so good. So for me, that's a wonderful thing about High street and that's offered to every patient. 

It doesn't matter if it's a vaccination or the vague, unwell, not herself type of. Type of situation. Everybody is given that opportunity to take that time if they need and they would like.

Julie South [00:07:08]:
You work in a pretty sophisticated team. You've got lots of technology. How is that to work with as well as a clinician?

Virginia Grice [00:07:23]:
I enjoy it. I've been doing veterinary work for a long time, you know, nearly, well, three decades, and I really like rolling with that technology. It's a gift. It's a gift to the patient, gift to the client. I enjoy it. 

I find what we have here, when we have visiting students, they're often surprised at what we are tooled up with and they'll often say, I didn't see that in my city placement. And there's a reason for that. It's because the emergency centre or the specialist centre down the road has that.

Virginia Grice [00:08:01]:
In Rockhampton, we don't have that situation. So particularly with the specialist support, therefore, local practitioners have to bone up and tool up. So it's a satisfying thing. 

We have quite advanced diagnostics and things like that. 

Good technology that we can reach out to specialists should we need it, quickly and efficiently. I think it's a very good thing about High street that, yeah, we do have those things.

Julie South [00:08:30]:
Talking about the not having an emergency centre just up the road like there are in big cities, that would mean that you're getting pretty interesting cases because you can't just refer up the road, you have to deal with a patient right then, right there. What would be your most. 

If you could just take one patient? I'm going to put you on the spot here. What would that be for you? The most satisfying or the most interesting?

Virginia Grice [00:08:59]:
Yeah, I'm probably thinking about a patient that had to be treated right there and then and was way too unstable to be transferred anywhere, which was probably. 

I can think of a little dog who was heavily pregnant, about to have her puppies and she was seizuring at the same time. So we had to deal with the seizuring situation and then also do an emergency Caesarean to deliver the puppies. 

That's probably a good example because that little patient wouldn't have survived a referral. Trip. And so you know the clinicians in Rockhampton, we are used to having to make those decisions always, of course we can call for phone backup and from our specialist colleagues if we are presented with something which we would have preferred to refer. 

But obviously the immediacy of this situation means we have to treat it here. So often we have telehealth support as well if there's something that.

Virginia Grice [00:09:58]:
That wouldn't work for.

Julie South [00:10:00]:
How about emergency after hours? The bane of, in New Zealand, at least the bane of pretty much every single veterinarian's working life. How's that been for you?

Virginia Grice [00:10:15]:
I came here having done a three month stint at a lovely practise in WA that was a general practise, but was also the sole provider of after hours emergency services for a region of 40,000 people in a remote area. 

And I realised there that I actually like it. So I may be a poor person to ask that. I do enjoy after hours. The issue always is it's disruptive in some ways for home life because of the unpredictable nature of it here. 

I enjoy the after hours. It's shared between ourselves and our colleagues and we also. Recently one of our Rockhampton colleagues has set up an emergency only after hours service.

Virginia Grice [00:11:05]:
And so that's great. There's a good base of people who can offer that here in Rockhampton, including ourselves. 

So if at any point we are being overwhelmed, we have a great relationship with the other after hours providers that we know that the animal can get good care if we need to do that.

Julie South [00:11:26]:
You have a special interest in eyes. How did that come about and how has working at High street supported that interest for you?

Virginia Grice [00:11:41]:
I really do. I, I think they're beautiful. I think animals eyes are beautiful, aren't they? All of them. 

I think I got interested several years ago and started doing some sort of, I wouldn't say postgraduate, but just continuing education courses. And the more I did, the more interested I. 

I got in eyes and the more beautiful I thought they were. Coming to High street has then allowed me to take a bit of a quantum leap. 

Previously what I, the study I'd done had increased my medicine and probably my confidence in the surgeries that most practitioners would like to do coming here.

Virginia Grice [00:12:22]:
I then did some more continuing education on corneal surgery, so actually on the eyeball itself and in particular on the surface of the eyeball. 

And so that means that now we can operate on animals whose eyes have been perhaps lacerated or ruptured or perhaps need a graft, things like that, those sort of high trauma cases. 

That otherwise normally would just immediately lose the eyeball and that's the end of the story. So High Street's been hugely supportive. We then we purchased all the equipment that we need. 

Clearly you need specialised, very, very tiny equipment, headsets, tiny suture, less than a. Like a hair's breadth. All these different things that most places don't have.

Virginia Grice [00:13:12]:
And we've also set up a kind of a referral relationship with the neighbouring clinics around CQ - Central Queensland. 

And I think it's rare that probably a day goes by where we don't get an inquiry from somebody who has an eye case that they're really wrestling with and they would like to refer that case to us. 

We've made it very clear that I am not a specialist. I have a special interest in ophthalmology and that I always keep in very close contact with the specialist team in Brisbane if there's something I'm not sure about. 

So the High Street's been enormously supportive. And in the next few months I have had the offer to go down to one of the specialist teams in Brisbane and I guess shadow one of my heroes for a few days. They offered that the other day to me because of the relationship we've built up with them. So it's very exciting and I'm very appreciative for that.

Julie South [00:14:12]:
What sort of vet do you think? What sort of person would. Would fit best inside High street vets? As a veterinarian, I think a person.

Virginia Grice [00:14:22]:
Who would enjoy working here is somebody who appreciates teamwork that does rely. 

Sometimes you have to rely on yourself and make your own decisions. Here you have the benefit of a very experienced team. So it would be somebody that enjoys being part of a team, but also who really enjoys listening to other people's thoughts. I mean, our nursing team. 

I think the nursing team here is fabulous and you need someone who will respect that team and really give them the respect they need and deserve and listen to them. 

Well, I think it would suit a person who enjoys taking their time with cases. Perhaps somebody who's so sick of just rushing things through, they're just so over that and they would like a chance to develop good relationships with the clients, to be able to get a good thorough history, and someone who enjoys investigating things to the nth degree, you know, as far as you can.

Virginia Grice [00:15:28]:
You know, perhaps somebody who's. Who's tired of their investigations having to be cut short due to time pressures or the rush of the next patient, those sorts of things.

Julie South [00:15:38]:
Is there anything that you would like the next vet to know that I haven't asked already.

Virginia Grice [00:15:46]:
That's a great question. Just that we like learning too. And if they bring something, their own interest, everybody's got their own interest. 

If they bring their own interest, their keenness, their expertise, just through whatever they're interested in and bring it to us, we would love to learn about that too. 

It's not like, well, there's one way and this is all we do. I'd like them to know that if they bring some experience and or opinions on how to treat a certain thing, that we would love to learn from them and talk about that too.

Julie South [00:16:23]:
Love that answer. That is a fantastic answer. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. There you have it. Dr. Virginia's perspective on what makes High street vet surgery exceptional.

Julie South [00:16:39]:
A practise that supports special interests, invests in advanced technology and gives veterinarians the time they need to practise quality medicine. 

Dr. Virginia's story highlights something important for any veterinarian considering regional practise, and that is, you don't have to compromise on professional development or case complexity. 

In fact, if, as Dr. Virginia discovered, you might find opportunities that you'd never get in the city. 

Coming up in our High Street Vet series, you'll learn from more team members to get the complete picture of this Rockhampton practise. Remember, they're actively seeking their next small animal veterinarian right now at vetclinicjobs.com 

I'll put the link in the show notes for you. Veterinary Voices is brought to you by Vet Clinic Jobs.

Julie South [00:17:35]:
Direct hiring reimagined. No recruitment agency. Until next time, this is Julie south signing off and inviting you to go out there and bring your gifts, your interests, your keenness, your expertise to wherever you practise medicine. 

Because, as Dr. Virginia beautifully put it, the best teams don't just want your skills, they want to learn from what you bring too.