When I think about the skills I learned as a veterinary technician, some of the first things that come to mind are the technical ones. Placing an IV catheter. Monitoring anesthesia. Calculating medications. Taking radiographs. Caring for hospitalized patients. These are essential to the job, but they’re only part of what goes into providing good-quality care.
A technician can calculate a CRI perfectly while also noticing that a patient seems more uncomfortable than they did an hour ago. They can prepare a patient for surgery while already thinking about what will be needed during recovery. They can explain a complicated medication schedule to an overwhelmed owner in a way that suddenly makes it feel manageable.
Moments like those rely on observation, anticipation, adaptability, communication, empathy, problem-solving, and teamwork. Technicians use them all day long. And I think there’s a lot we can learn from the way those skills come together to create better care.
Read: Introducing Attending: A Message to Our Veterinary Community
Read: Plan Your 2027 CE: Top 16 Veterinary Conferences
Paying Attention to the Small Things
Much of veterinary technician care begins with paying attention. A hospitalized patient may have normal vitals, but seem quieter than they were earlier. A patient in pain may shift their posture or become less willing to move. A cat that happily accepted food in the morning may suddenly turn away from it.
Technicians spend so much time with their patients that they become familiar with what’s normal for that individual patient, not just what’s normal on paper.
Monitoring a patient is more than recording numbers at scheduled intervals. It’s watching behavior, comfort, appetite, mobility, mentation, and all the small changes that help tell the larger story of how that patient is doing. Sometimes the most important thing a technician does is notice that something is different.
It’s a skill that translates beyond patient care, too. Paying attention helps us recognize when an owner is confused, when a teammate is overwhelmed, or when something in a process isn’t working quite the way it should.
Thinking About What Comes Next
Technicians also become very good at thinking ahead. While preparing a patient for a procedure, they’re already thinking about what will be needed during recovery. While caring for a hospitalized patient, they’re keeping track of when medications, treatments, diagnostics, and reassessments are due. And when a patient is preparing to go home, attention shifts to what the owner will need, like medications, instructions, follow-up care, and answers to questions they haven’t yet thought to ask.
On a busy treatment floor, this anticipation helps technicians keep care moving while juggling multiple patients and competing priorities. It often happens in the background. Until you work alongside a technician who is exceptionally good at it and realize they always seem to have the next thing ready before anyone asks.
That habit of thinking one or two steps ahead can make things easier not only for the patient, but for the whole team involved in their care.
Being Willing to Change the Plan
Of course, patient care doesn’t always go according to plan. The dog who tolerated their first blood draw may have had enough by the second. A patient in pain may need a completely different approach to positioning. A cat may make it very clear that the restraint technique you planned to use isn’t going to happen.
Technicians constantly adjust their approach based on the patient in front of them: changing positioning, finding a different way to administer a medication, giving a frightened patient more time, or working with the veterinarian to find another solution altogether. The same thing happens throughout the practice. Schedules change. Emergencies arrive. Equipment doesn’t cooperate. Priorities shift.
Veterinary medicine teaches you pretty quickly that changing the plan doesn’t mean the original one was wrong. Sometimes the circumstances, or the patient, tell you there’s a better way forward.
Read: Free Veterinary Student Resources: Tools to Build Clinical Confidence
Read: On the Hunt for a New Veterinary Job? Start Here
Meeting People Where They Are
Technicians care for patients and support the people who care for them, too. A discharge conversation may involve explaining six medications to an owner who is exhausted after spending the night worried about their pet. A routine appointment can suddenly become emotional when unexpected results come back. Even a simple instruction can feel overwhelming to someone who is scared.
Technicians learn to read those situations much like they read their patients.
Sometimes an owner needs a more detailed explanation. Sometimes they need something demonstrated. Sometimes they need written instructions they can look at later. And sometimes they just need another minute to process what they’ve heard. The same information doesn’t always work for every person.
Whether we’re caring for a pet owner, training someone new, or helping a teammate through a change, good communication often means adjusting how we communicate based on the person in front of us.
Knowing When to Step In
Exceptional patient care also requires technicians to constantly coordinate with the people around them. A change noticed during a treatment needs to make its way to the veterinarian. An updated medical plan needs to be communicated to the rest of the team. A patient moving from one shift to another needs a thorough handoff.
At the same time, technicians are often helping one another. One person is holding while another draws blood. Someone notices that a teammate is tied up with an emergency and gives their patient’s medication. Another technician jumps in to help recover a patient from anesthesia. Those small interactions happen hundreds of times in a veterinary hospital.
But what I’ve learned and noticed is that some of the strongest teams I’ve worked with didn’t need someone to ask for help every time. People paid attention to what was happening around them and stepped in when they could. Great care may be delivered to one patient at a time, but it’s very rarely delivered by just one person.
Read: A Major Milestone for Veterinary Pharmacy: Official Specialty Recognition
Read: How ScribbleVet & Plumb’s Work Together From Visit to Follow-Up
Creating More Space for Better Care
Now that I work in veterinary technology, I think about these skills from a different perspective. A lot of what technicians do exceptionally well requires their attention. They need to notice the subtle change in a patient, think ahead, communicate with the care team, answer an owner’s questions, and adapt when something doesn’t go according to plan.
Technology can’t do those things for them, but it can help reduce some of the work competing for that attention.
That’s one of the things I appreciate about what we build at Instinct. Treatment sheets can help technicians see what’s due without keeping an entire patient’s schedule in their heads. Connected patient information can help the care team understand what’s happening. Automations can take repetitive workflow steps off someone’s mental checklist.
Technology doesn’t replace the skills technicians bring to patient care. At its best, it gives them more opportunity to use them.
The Skills That Stay With You
I don’t spend my days doing many of the things I once did as a veterinary technician in a clinical setting. But when I think about the technicians I’ve most admired throughout my career, I remember much more than who could place the most difficult catheter.
I remember the technician who noticed a patient was just a little quieter than they had been an hour earlier. The one who somehow always had the next thing ready. The one who could change their entire approach to make a frightened patient more comfortable. The one who could make a worried owner feel a little less overwhelmed. And the one who stepped in when another technician needed an extra set of hands.
Those skills helped us provide exceptional care to our patients. But they’ve also stayed with me long after I left clinical practice. Pay attention. Think ahead. Be willing to adapt. Meet people where they are. Know when to step in.
Veterinary technicians practice these things every day because caring for patients requires them. And I think all of us can learn something from that.
