More voices, less turf war in veterinary medicine: full analysis

A conversation about veterinary infighting is moving into the open. In an April 29 episode of The Veterinary Viewfinder, Dr. Ernie Ward and Beckie Mossor, MPA, RVT, took aim at “tribalism” inside veterinary organizations and made the case that professionals shouldn’t feel pressured to pick one camp over another. Just days later, Animal Health News and Views published Tori Williams’ essay urging shelters and veterinary medicine to stop working in parallel and start acting like the interconnected systems they already are. Taken together, the pieces point to a wider frustration with silos in vet med, whether those silos are between associations, between shelters and private practice, or between veterinarians and technicians. (drernieward.com)

That frustration is landing in a profession that’s structurally diverse. AVMA’s 2025 economic report shows most veterinarians still work in companion animal practice, but meaningful shares work in colleges and universities, industry, government, and other sectors. In other words, organized veterinary medicine is trying to speak for a field that no longer fits neatly into one practice model or one professional identity. At the same time, newer and more specialized groups have gained influence, including the Association of Shelter Veterinarians, which has expanded guidance, leadership activity, and educational resources around shelter and community animal health. (ebusiness.avma.org)

The immediate spark here is commentary rather than a regulatory filing or peer-reviewed study, but it reflects real fault lines. Ward’s site describes the April 29 podcast episode, “More Voices, Less Turf War in Vet Med,” as a discussion of why colleagues put themselves in one organizational camp or another, and why they should consider joining more than one. That message aligns closely with Ward and Mossor’s January episode on whether organized veterinary medicine is still serving the people it represents, where they argued that transparency, inclusion, and listening matter more as the profession grows more complex, and warned that ignoring new ideas risks irrelevance. (drernieward.com)

Williams’ May 1 essay makes a parallel case from the shelter side. The article preview says shelters and veterinary clinics share the same mission of caring for animals and supporting the people who love them, yet too often operate separately instead of as connected parts of the same field. That argument lands against a long-running push to formalize shelter medicine’s role within the profession. ASV says it has developed position statements and informational documents in response to demand from members, shelters, and state veterinary boards, while ASPCA Pro notes that AVMA formally recognized shelter medicine as a veterinary specialty in 2014. Those developments helped give shelter medicine a clearer institutional voice, but they also underscore how easy it is for subfields to build in parallel rather than in partnership. (animalhealthnewsandviews.com)

There’s also a technician representation thread running through this conversation. Mossor has been one of the more visible national voices on that front. NAVTA announced in 2024 that the AAVSB approved its request supporting veterinary technician representation on state boards, calling the move a milestone for the profession, and Mossor was quoted as NAVTA president. NAVTA also thanked Mossor by name when announcing 2025 board leadership changes, underscoring her recent role in organized advocacy. That matters because debates over “turf war” in vet med often aren’t only about which association someone joins, but about which professional groups are treated as essential participants in governance and policy. (navta.net)

Why it matters: For veterinary professionals, the practical stakes are bigger than association politics. Collaboration across organizations can shape workforce rules, technician utilization, shelter transfer protocols, disaster response, access-to-care efforts, and the profession’s public voice. Existing examples show that cross-sector work is possible: AVMA has partnered with the Street Dog Coalition on care delivery for pets of people experiencing homelessness, and the National Animal Rescue & Sheltering Coalition includes AVMA alongside major welfare and response organizations. The implication is that when groups align around a concrete problem, the field can act as one system. When they don’t, clinics, shelters, teams, and pet parents may face duplicated effort, inconsistent messaging, or missed opportunities for coordinated advocacy. (avma.org)

Industry reaction, at least from the available public commentary, seems less like backlash and more like an ongoing push for reform. Ward and Mossor have repeatedly framed these conversations not as attacks on organized veterinary medicine, but as attempts to make it more responsive. In January, they argued the issue wasn’t “burning things down,” but caring enough to improve them. That framing is important because it suggests this debate is moving from the margins toward a more mainstream question: how should veterinary organizations evolve to reflect a profession that is more interdisciplinary, more team-based, and less willing to accept closed-door decision-making? (drernieward.com)

What to watch: The next signal will be whether this rhetoric turns into structural change, such as broader technician inclusion, stronger shelter-clinic partnerships, more cross-membership collaboration among associations, or leadership models that better reflect the profession’s mix of practice settings and roles. If these commentaries resonate, they could help shift the conversation from defending organizational territory to building a more connected veterinary field. (navta.net)