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Essential care guidance for veterinary practices
Every veterinary practice needs to form its own opinion of what it considers essential.
What constitutes an essential veterinary service?

The UK government has updated its list of premises that can remain open during the COVID-19 coronavirus outbreak to include veterinary surgeries. In light of this move, this article aims to provide guidance on what constitutes emergency and essential care.

It is important to stress that veterinary practices provide a number of essential services, and can only run emergency services for a few days before the essential services start to build up.

Emergency services
These are services that must be done urgently. Examples of veterinary emergencies requiring immediate attention include difficulty breathing, severe bleeding, collapse, some seizures, road traffic accidents and difficult calvings.

Essential services
These are services that must be done but not necessarily urgently. These services include the provision of non-routine operations and essential medicines, the nursing care of wounds, some immunisations and ongoing medical treatments.

Every veterinary practice needs to form its own opinion of what it considers essential and to make a decision based on this.

Social distancing and face-to-face contact
It is vital that all veterinary practices take steps to introduce social distancing measures to reduce the transmission of COVID-19 between people. These measures should be carried out in addition to increased handwashing and good respiratory hygiene. More information about social distancing can be found here.

It is also advised that the number of clients seen face-to-face should be kept to an absolute minimum. Please click here for advice in how to reduce face-to-face contact in veterinary practices.

MRCVSOnline will endeavour to keep the profession updated on COVID-19 coronavirus as the situation unfolds. Please don't hesitate to contact us with any ideas or suggestions as to how we can help with measures to control the spread of the virus.

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Update to TB Advice services

News Story 1
 Vets wishing to access TB Advice services can now use a digital contact form, following updates announced by the APHA.

This new, streamlined service allows customers to provide all necessary information upfront, minimising additional contact between the APHA and the customer. It also ensures questions are directed to the right team, significantly reducing response times.

More contact forms are expected to be announced in the coming months. For more information, visit Gov.uk  

Click here for more...
News Shorts
New form for online veterinary medicines retailers

The Veterinary Medicines Directorate (VMD) has produced a new online form for retailers wishing to sell veterinary medicines on the internet.

The form replace the previous Word version and is part of the VMD's ongoing commitment to digitise its processes. Anyone retailing prescription medicines online, including POM-V, POM-VPS and NFA-VPS categories, is lawfully required to register with the VMD before trading.

The change only applies to new applicants. Retailers already listed on the VMD's Register of Online Retailers or registered under the Accredited Internet Retailer Scheme (AIRS) do not need to do anything.