Hello, it's Anthony Chadwick from the webinar vet welcoming you to another episode of Vet Chat, which is the number one veterinary podcast, but I have to say that there is some serious competition coming my way, or collaboration, however you want to look at it. Really pleased to have Fiona McGilvre on with me today, who is a fellow veterinary podcaster. So welcome Fiona.
Thank you, Anthony. Yes, it's a small world and these podcasts are just popping up all over the place, aren't they? But I think there's plenty of space in the veterinary arena, so collaboration.
Yeah, definitely it's, it is about collaboration in the online space and. Obviously as a vet, your, your podcast is very much er the McVett podcast is very much around communications. Yes, so I had been thinking about setting up a podcast for a long time.
So probably about 4 or 6 months, and I thought, OK, what can we frame it around? And I thought, well, what I do in my day to day job is centred around three things, which is communication, cows, and coffee, which is my main passion in life. So why not make the podcast about the same three, elements.
So when I contact. The guests that I'd like to interview, I mentioned that those are the, that's the sort of framework. It does catch a few of them out, and they have commented that if they're perhaps not from a veterinary or farming background, that that is the most random they've request they've received for some time.
But yeah, those are the three sort of elements that that the podcast is, is, is sort of formed around. And of course we got to meet each other through the veterinary Marketing Association. Obviously you are a vet as well.
Perhaps just tell us a little bit for, for people who aren't familiar with you, a little bit of your background, of your, you know, backstory, etc. Yeah, thank you. Thanks for asking.
It is a little bit varied. I started off, so 25 years ago, I graduated from the Royal Vet College, and I spent 8 years working in clinical practise. I locumed for some of those years, did large animal companion, a mixed practise, so bit of a range.
I even once had to look at a snake, which was a bit disconcerting. I moved out of practise. I had the opportunity to go into animal health, so I went to work for a company called Merrill, which is no longer in existence.
It's, it's been taken into Boeing or Ingelheim, but I was the technical services manager for, for ruminant Products then. So that was really exciting because it allowed me to study, we were saying before we went live about the definition of an expert, learning more. About less less broad topics.
But, so yeah, so I got really interested in learning aroundpartology and things like bovine respiratory disease, and I was involved in sort of educating farm vets and farmers about the different diseases that we that we work in. And then I moved into a marketing role, moved to Olanco. And during my time working in both companies, I had the opportunity to speak to quite a number of farm vets and it seemed that a common theme was.
Maybe getting frustrated with difficult farmers or farmers that didn't seem to listen to the advice they were giving and they found that was quite frustrating, especially taken a lot of effort and time to maybe write a report to to address a particular issue on farm. So I I started thinking, oh this is, this is interesting. I wonder why that might be.
So I, and also when I joined Animal Health, I noticed there was quite a change in dynamic between working in a sort of small. Unit in a veterinary practise to work in, you know, global company. So you'd be interacting with a lot of different people in different roles and And one of the things I found was that I, I felt that some people are quite difficult to work with.
So this sort of theme of why are people difficult, you know, sort of sparked me to to go on a training course that explained that actually this is down to our values and beliefs and also the way we communicate with others can really impact how well we get along with people. So This brings on the next phase of of when I left Animal Health to set up my own business, in 2016, I was really keen to focus more on communication and behaviour change and understanding those things. So I, I set up Mac vet, Cattle Communications Limited, which is a terribly long title for a company.
And one of the things I started offering them was running communication skills training courses for farm vets in practise, . I was using a or introducing techniques or frameworks such as motivational interviewing, which Doctor Alison Bard at Bristol University had brought into the arena of farm veterinary practise, so I've worked with her. And then in 2019, I took on a Master of Researcher degree looking at nonverbal communication between vets and farmers.
So. So I've sort of changed roles and, you know, focus, etc. But that's sort of common theme of understanding communication and trying to get along better with people has been a sort of consistent theme, just trying to sort of understand more and having my own business now just give me the opportunity to, to be able to focus on that and and hopefully share that now with, with, with people who are interested in the same sort of thing.
I think comms is so important, verbal or non-verbal. Obviously, when you see reports around Royal College complaints and so on. Then often communication is is one of the key problems in that people who have complained to the Royal College don't feel that they've been listened to.
So it is obviously an area that we can get better at. I I think I'm quite a good communicator and I spoke to the team recently about something I wanted them all to do. I spoke to them, you know, I sent them a text, and about 20% actually did what I had kind of said that I wanted them to do.
So it's really interesting how we can improve on, on those things. Is the part of a problem, as you were suggesting, if you've got a lot of difficult clients, maybe the problem's more about yourself than about the the clients themselves. Yeah, I think you're absolutely hit the nail on the head there.
And this is what I started to understand on that very first course I went to, when I first joined Animal Health, which is, you know, talking about difficult people and, and actually it's that whole explanation between, well, why do we perceive people to be difficult, perhaps. And often the the cases that we hold different values, different beliefs, and, you know, well, it's well known in psychology that we. You know, if people are like us, we, we tend to have more positive feelings towards those people.
If people are not like us, so they might have different habits or beliefs or values, then we, we find it difficult to communicate with those people. And I think what the what that sort of training course and my subsequent, you know, learnings looking at things like neuroscience and psychology, etc. The, you know, the explanation is that.
You know, if we can kind of Make ourselves more aware of, you know, being open minded to the fact that other people may have different opinions, different values. No one's right, no one's wrong. But just Even having that initial sort of reset if you like, that I'm gonna be open minded and listen to this person, I may not agree with them, but.
You made a good point for someone to feel listened to. Straight away gives you more chance of being able to connect with them. So if you have to communicate and, you know, give messages or ask them to do something, you're at least giving yourself a better chance to do so.
Obviously on many occasions, we might not, you know, if we're not. You know, we don't like someone and we don't have to interact with them. We choose to, you know, to walk away literally, not metaphorically, but if we have to work with people, then to your point, if we can understand why there may be conflict, why we may find someone, and we have to work with that person, it makes it a little bit easier to, to, to sort of come with that, open mindedness and that sort of outlook if you like.
I mean, it's quite, you know, I'm not saying it's easy. It can be quite draining, can't it? To, to sort of listen to someone who has got opposing opinions, but if the, if the greater achievements of being able to work together effectively, it it it can be achieved, then.
You know, it it's obviously useful to try and work that way. And listening is such an important part of communication, isn't it? We have, I think as a society become quite binary.
There's a right and a left or a right and a wrong. But getting people together and actually then listening to people's way of thinking and perhaps triangulating bringing in mediators and so on, often really helps to be able to see the bigger picture that actually all the beliefs that I've held or the values or or the ideas that I have about a topic. Maybe I'm not as well informed as I think I am.
This is the importance I suppose of CPD of continuing to be having an open and a growth mindset and being prepared to learn and. Being prepared to change, one of my favourite lecturers at Webinarest is a guy called Mike Willard, who's a professor of gastroenterology, I think he's retired now. But in his typical Texan drawl he would say, quite self-deprecating, everything I taught you 10 years ago was a lie.
Now that's, I'm not even gonna do a Texan accent because I was waiting for the he has this gorgeous Texan accent, which is almost worth listening to, even if you're not wanting to learn about gastroenterology, but he said everything I taught you 10 years ago was a lie, I just didn't realise. And I think it's having that mindset of. Sometimes being challenged by somebody with a completely different idea ideology.
It's actually quite interesting to ask them why they're thinking that way, isn't it? Yeah, mhm. Yeah, you make a really good point and it's something that came up in a conversation with one of my guests, Doctor Amy Jackson, who has just done a PhD, looking at public perception of the dairy industry, for example, and And one point she was making in our conversation was that actually, A lot of the time we, we, you know, people in the dairy industry can have that.
Sort of defensive attitude. We, we don't want to listen to other people. It's like, well, this is the way we've always done it.
You know, just accept it kind of an attitude of it's quite extreme and there are, you know, different shades amongst that. But in her work, she was interviewing members of the public to understand why they perhaps had feelings or values, you know, and what was, you know, what was concerning them and and to your point that you made right early on in our conversation. Oftentimes these people that you're speaking to felt.
You know, it was a really nice feeling to be able to speak to her. And she said it was difficult to start with because naturally you want to respond to some of the things that people are saying, but to actually sit there and and try to listen to the whole conversation or the what the person's telling you without interruption, gives you so much of a better chance to really hear, you know, to really hear and absorb what they're trying to say. Then you reflect and think, OK.
I might not agree with that opinion, but I'm, I'm really glad you've told me because we need to be aware of other people's beliefs and values, if we're gonna all move forward together, sort of thing. So, so that's just one example where, yeah, yeah, again, this is sort of what I'm trying to share with, with my listeners. And and what you've raised there, you know, that's importance of listening and and hearing other people's beliefs and why they might think a certain way is really important because otherwise we end up in silos and as you say, that binary sort of way of thinking which isn't helpful to anybody.
Yeah, sure. It, I think it was, it was the Stephen Covey's book Seven Habits of Highly Effective People. One of those was seek first to understand and then to be understood, so.
I, I've always found that really useful to listen to people and I found in my own practise, and this sort of came latterly that I, you know, I didn't have many difficult clients and I thought after a while. In the end, it is that kind of golden rule, treat others as you would like to be treated, even different different people and. One of the things we've also done in our company is when people come for an interview, we do some psychometric testing to see how they will fit in with the team.
Is that something that you think we should be doing more of in, in companies? Did you have an experience of that in any of the animal health companies that you worked for? Mhm.
Not so much. I, and I don't know whether it was for my role. I think the company I worked for first had, included psychometric testing for some of the salesforce, but, maybe fortunately they didn't try it out on me.
I might never have, I never have joined the animal health industry. I think as you say, it's, it's it's, it's useful for a company to understand how, how, you know, people coming in. Might respond and react to the structure and the because obviously they're entering a culture of society, aren't they, that that is, you know, that you've probably fostered over quite a number of years and it's good to know that they understand.
You know, what kind of conditions they're coming into and as you say, to understand perhaps what this person's values are and whether you feel like they're going to be a good fit. So I think it's useful definitely to to do something like that. Yeah, yeah.
Do you think that also helps with The values that you have maybe as a veterinary practitioner that you also try to pick clients that have similar values and perhaps that's where there is a conflict and I remember people talking about is it good to be able to fire the occasional client, but almost before you start. Maybe somebody, you know, isn't perhaps thinking in a preventative way. If you're taking on that client.
Maybe there's some sort of commitment that they could change or, or is that really something that you start in the relationship and then it's, as you say, with behavioural change, you can encourage them to move more to your way of thinking, you know, around Paris anti anti-almintics, how you might use those in in their farm and so on, where they may have a a fixed mindset or. They take your advice, but then buy the drugs elsewhere. Is this, are these some of the areas that you find that you're chatting with clients about as well?
Yeah, I mean, I think to your point of, you know, my practise culture is X, Y and Z sort of thing and and if a client comes in and they're clearly not wanting to . As you said, they're not a good fit, then I think, yes, I would imagine that the best thing would be to to perhaps suggest. If, if you feel there's no way forward, or to or to get them to adapt to to your way of working, then I agree to fire that client would make sense.
I guess just listening to what you said as well though, when we sort of talk about his vets or any professionals, you know, giving my advice, telling people, you know, that sort of approach of, you know, telling them that this is the way it is, I think sometimes. It's useful to sort of step back a little bit and in addition to that, explain why that perhaps is, you know, why that is the stance that you take. Because often what happens is if someone's just told this is the way it is, they tend to react sort of negatively to that.
So I think absolutely that's your advice, but to providing the explanation, you'll find. Usually people are more open and willing to sort of appreciate why that advice is how it how it is. I mean this is something that came up recently when I've been involved with Aberystwyth University working with the veterinary er prescribing champions.
And just sort of asking them how they've been getting on with their conversations with farmers about reducing antimicrobial usage. Many of the vets were were saying that they've found that when they do explain, this is the reason behind us giving this advice, they've said, yeah, the farmers are far more engaged and prepared to listen to. You know, to, to their suggestions to reduce antimicrobial usage, than if they just sort of said, well, this is, you know, we've been given this directive.
This is, this is what we're going to do now. You can't have any more kind of thing, you know, that's obviously quite black and white and extreme, but it's interesting to hear from the fields that that that is something that resonates, you know, with between vets and farmers talking about potentially what's quite a difficult topic, you know, reducing the use of antibiotics. So, so yeah.
Yeah, I think it's interesting. Fiona Lovatt was very much another Fiona involved in the antibiotic stewardship. And I suppose really, we are all marketers, you know, you were obviously a professional marketer, but we all are marketers in that part of what we try to do, it's this art of persuasion, isn't it?
It's encouraging people to take the actions that. We want them to take, not in an unethical way, but in a way that we think is appropriate to help the animals, and I think antibiotic stewardship is a great example of that, that you can do it very much carrot or stick, but most people appreciate encouragement rather than browbeating, don't they? You, you very rarely convert somebody to your way of thinking by completely beating them in a debate, do you?
Yeah. It's always that often hardens people's attitudes more, doesn't it? Very much so, yeah.
And I think, again, one point that I, bring up in my training sessions and talk about behaviour change is actually it can be useful as well to assume that everybody's interested in making positive change, you know, because as you say, farmers or animal owners in general want to, you know, do the best for their animals, . And then it's maybe finding what is their own intrinsic motivation to change. And again, that can take a little bit of time and effort asking the right questions, but if we can find what someone's intrinsic motivation to make a change to achieve that same goal, that gives you a far better chance of helping them to make positive change.
So, so yeah, so that's again another skill, and you mentioned it before, that sort of growth mindset. Some vets I speak to sort of say, well, you know, you're either a good communicator or not, you can't become better, you know what I mean? And I do like to to raise or mention you've you've mentioned it already that growth mindset actually has been proven in psychological fields that actually.
Any, you know, communication is a skill like, like many others. If you want to put in the time and effort to, to work on improving, you can. I'm not saying you're ever necessarily going to be as good as someone that you might perceive as a fantastic communicator, but you can get better.
Yeah, yeah. Just you were talking before about motivational interviewing as part of the studies that you've done with your growth mindset and your, your lifelong learning mindset. Talk to us a little bit and maybe give us some concrete examples of how a vets.
Large animal or small, could use motivational interviewing to perhaps improve some of their results if they feel that sometimes clients don't really pay attention and follow what they've advised. Mhm, yeah. So it, it was fascinating when I first became aware of the work that was being done in this field.
So, motivational interviewing was developed in the 80s, by two psychologists, clinical psychologists who were working in the field of alcohol addiction. So you may think, gosh, how, how have we ended up with a motivational interviewing now being brought into farm animal practise a bit random. But it was.
As I said before, Dr. Alison Bard, when she was looking at, you know, creating a PhD project, she was very keen to understand perhaps why farm vets who were talking about mastitis and lameness control, she was sort of fascinated by the fact that there's so much research done in these areas. We know so much more about disease control, best practise, etc.
And yet when you look at the statistics or the incidence of disease. You know, it's not really been a massive impact there to to reduce that significantly, and she was wondering maybe this is partly to do with how Vets and farmers talk about the topic, and, and maybe encourage the farmers to to increase the uptake of farm vet's advice. So she thought, well, wouldn't it be interesting if we could take the principles and motivational interviewing and apply them to farm vet practise and help farm vets have conversations with the farmers where when they're talking about making changes on farm, they can use a sort of framework or a set of tools to to really sort of evoke.
Like I said before, that intrinsic motivation that the farmer has to improve the situation, but also for the vets to understand what possible blockers there might be, so. So motivational interview motivational interviewing, which again, from a marketing perspective, we've said on many occasions is so unhelpful because it's not not the most, you know, what what does it mean you sort of think from the from the title, but. So MI it has sort of, a sort of values based approach, if you like.
So if you, if you're prepared to work with this framework, so having helpful conversations about change, you start from that approach of, you know, the person I'm speaking to is, is an expert in their own right. They know the farm, they know the workers, they know that how, how much time they can devote to this. So in effect, we're two experts working together.
So it's that collaborative approach. And you also Strive to try and understand as much as possible their worldview. So you're kind of, you know that saying, you know, you have to walk in someone's shoes before you can understand, you know, what they're going through and how they see things.
So it gives you, that sort of framework to try and investigate and work out what's important to the farmer. Why, what he might be thinking about the changes that you're suggesting, and how you might be able to tap into to that internal motivation to to make change and what's important to them. So it looks at sort of things like recognising to start with it as vets and other professionals, we tend to have a sort of Directive approach, if you've come across this before, where we believe, you know, it's it's not, it's just a sort of natural response to being, someone who wants to help people.
So we like to identify, you know, problems. We might go on farm and think, oh well, yes, gosh, there's a lot of lame cows here, we must, you know, speak to the farmer about reducing lameness and there's nothing wrong with that, but. Perhaps the farmer is more worried about something else that's going on the farm, going on on the farm, or perhaps they're having issues in the family.
It it's kind of not jumping into that directive approach of this is what we need to do. Here's my advice, here's report. You know, let's crack on and do it.
And then that's why the vet may feel frustrated on subsequent visits. You go back and you think, oh, nothing's happened. So going back to that sort of the, the, the conversations I'd had with farm.
So motivational interviewing. Really encourages you to become, interested in in learning what's going on in that farmer's world. So you're asking things open questions like, you know, what's the most important thing at the moment?
You know, we might be here to have a chat about BVD control, but, you know, what, what's worrying you the most at the moment on farm. So you can explore those things. It's kind of also recognising that.
Unless you, it's almost like, unless you clear that sort of barrier of someone thinking about, oh, I've got to ring X because something's broken on the farm and I must get them to come round. If I'm trying to then say to you, right, we must do this on mastitis and, you know, I need you to do more lame blameless checks. Until we've asked, you know, what might be on their mind, you know yourself with anything in day to day life, you're preoccupied, aren't you?
So. So again, MI, it's just sort of giving you that opening your eyes to how you might talk to someone to work out what's going on in their world and then to start. You know, once you've focused on an agreed topic of interest, you know, well I'd I'd like actually to to reduce the number of calves that keep coming down with pneumonia.
OK, you know, sort of asking for their input. So what have you tried up till now? You're working on that collaborative sort of platform or approach, asking open questions, and some of the farm vets that were involved in Alison's project, you know, they would try these sort of this framework, this approach to speak to the farmers, they felt a bit hesitant to obviously at first you think, oh my goodness, if I ask these open questions, I'll look a bit daft because I probably should know the answer to it.
But what their feedback was that. You know, it's actually really interesting what we were able to to learn through asking just a few simple open questions. One farm, one farm vet, which Alison always mentions and because it really resonated with it was they said, you know, we had some really soft answers from a really hard farmer.
So again it's just giving someone the opportunity to. You said, you know, to be heard, to be listened to. And then, you know, recognising this is what's important in their world, so we can both try and achieve.
An improvement in animal health and welfare, but perhaps we need to see what each other's, you know, focus is, you know, concerns, priorities exactly. And and as you said, open versus closed questions, and I remember learning about this fairly early on in the career, you know, a question that requires a yes and no. You much prefer to get a free hand from people, don't you, where they can tell you a little bit about the dog, cats, cow, horse, whatever.
So that, that is, that's really, I think a, a really good tip for people listening that when they are consulting, if they're asking too many closed questions, it can become very prescriptive, can't it, I suppose. Yeah, I think a lot of people feel a bit, I mean, I always remember this cartoon from the vet record years ago, the 10 minute consult, you know, it's like sort of start the top stopwatch because as vets we're obviously very conscious that, you know, like it probably more in companion. In practise, I guess.
But, you know, we're sort of thinking, oh gosh, the clients coming in and they pull out the list and you're thinking, blimey, I've only got 10 minutes, you know. So I think a lot of people might be a bit hesitant to ask more open questions thinking this is going to prolong the whole sort of thing and oh, I just need to get this done. And absolutely, that is, you know, that is something I'm not saying, you know, it's the right, it's the only right thing to do is just ask loads of open questions.
But I think if you are finding there's maybe be barriers to helping someone make changes or you're getting frustrated that someone's not changing, just adding even one or two open questions is really the only way we're ever going to find out what's in someone's, you know, in someone's head, in someone's mind. So, so yeah, I think. It's useful and I would always encourage everyone, you know, keep it simple in the training sessions that we have.
I'd love it if, if, you know, the vets leaving the training sessions, just ask one or two more open questions in each consultation. And I think, you know, it's like anything behaviour change if we get. Rewarded by having some learning some new pieces of information that we never would have heard before.
It, you know, it gives you the courage to sort of go on and sort of use them a little bit more. So I think they're very powerful, yeah. One of my advantages doing dermatology was I had one hour consults and that.
I, I obviously knew a bit more about dermatology than maybe most vets, but, but actually I think the key thing I had was an hour. Hm. To and of which I've probably spent 20 minutes just chatting to the clients at the beginning and asking those questions, you know, what are you feeding?
How is it doing on its weeing and its pooing and all those sort of things. And that would often help you so much in coming to the 3 or 4 things that you thought the dog had before you even, you know, touched the dog. So I, I think it's the same almost with farm animal practise, and I remember, you know, I did 2 years at the beginning of my career.
You go to the farm, you do the work, come in for a cup of tea. It is very much about building relationships, isn't it? And I think farm animal practise is much more different than.
Where often small animal is a bit more transactional, they're in and they're out, they're in and they're out, you see 30 people a day. If you get to develop a relationship with a farmer and they like you, then they're more likely to trust you and take your advice, whereas if it is very transactional, possibly that's why. Farmers don't actually pay as much attention to the farm vet when he comes in if he's not prepared to.
I, the world may have changed because it's 30 years since I did farm animal practise, but that ability to just stop and have a cup of tea and, you know, a piece of toast or something, I think is, is so important to develop those relationships which can be, you know, for 1020, 30 years, can't they? I think you're absolutely right and and and it's. I think it is pretty unique, isn't it, that sort of farm vet and farmer relationship, it's certainly something I look back and, and, you know, really valued at the time.
You can't beat it. You, you do tend to have those sort of special relationships, as you say, sort of sitting over the farm table with a cup of tea. I think possibly the risk is.
And again I go back to sort of academic research papers, etc. And I'm guilty of this as well, but you know, we'll write, oh farm vets need to have better communication skills. It seems there is this sort of, you know, difference between yes, special relationship and yet that sort of advisory role, you know, farm vets may get a little bit frustrated that, oh well, they didn't make this change until ex adviser came on the farm or, you know, he's spoke to another farmer and and yet I've been trying to get him to make this change for ages.
So whilst there is definitely that special relationship, I think there is still the need to sort of Adapt a little bit to, to enable, if you want to as a farm vet to give more, you know, to be more of an advisor, and to have your advice taken on board. I think there is still that little bit of a, you know, guide that might be necessary to, you know, to structure your conversations a little bit more about behaviour change. So.
Another person I spoke to for the podcast, Teo Lamb, who had written the paper called the Reset Mindset Model. He, he sort of pointed out as his main, you know, watch out sort of thing for farm bets is, yes, it's great to have the cup of tea, and the, and the banter, but don't forget the reason also that you're there, which is probably to, to move on, you know, maybe the BVD control, programme. So what I'm not trying to contradict what I said earlier, which is, you know, you're going there with your agenda, you must make sure you achieve it.
But if you don't have some, some sort of focus, you do risk just having the chat. But you're not perceive, yes, you're not perceived as the best person to come to for advice on certain things, which can frustrate you as a vet. So, so it's, yeah, I think it's, it's a, yeah, an interesting mix.
I always like to have a tiny bit of sustainability in pretty much all the podcasts, sometimes quite a bit of sustainability. What do you think of elms? Is that going to help, perhaps that visit that, vets can have, I think it's once a year with the farm.
Is that going far though, is that gonna help to maybe change the mindset of farmers to see vets more as advisors than fixer-uppers of cows, cows or? Whatever. Yeah, again, I've spoken to a number of vets who.
Who seem to be a bit frustrated that the farmers aren't seeing it as an opportunity to to to get together and talk through . You know, opportunities on farm to to focus on different things. I think possibly where there is a a difficulty to see how it's beneficial, and this is what I've heard is that, you know, a lot of the dairy farmers, for example, will be already having the vets on far more frequently than say bee farmers.
So I think they perceive this as They don't really know how it fits, do you know what I mean? It's like, well, we're doing this anyway, this is, this is not really useful to us. I mean, I'm like you, I think, well, perhaps we need a better way of marketing it as vets to, to the farmers.
I think, you know, if we, if we're going to get paid to, to come on farm, I would think it is an opportunity to maybe, you know, have that opportunity to, to, to look at some sort of, areas on the farm that you'd never thought of before. Maybe just have a farm walk and, you know, take the opportunity, you know, it's paid for. Let's go round and and see what might crop up and, you know, oh, should we talk about that?
I think, farm vets have suggested that yes, when it comes to sheep and beef farmers who perhaps don't have as regular contact with their with their vets, it, yeah, definitely is of benefit and and as you say, is it an opportunity to maybe have that more consultative approach for sure. Yeah. So I think there's an opportunity there.
I think there's still a little bit of You know, lack of clarity, how we could perhaps sell it in or get dairy farmers to engage with this being important and useful, probably the vets, you know, be helpful to, to sort of see how they could sell it in a little bit more. But I'm, you know, having said that, I've not spoken to maybe the farm vets that have been really successful using this. I'm sure we'll we'll hear from them.
I'm just looking it up now. Environmental land management schemes and it's really set up by the government. I've heard mixed reports about it, but to encourage, you know, that more sustainable farming within, within the farm as well and obviously that fits in with reducing antibiotics and anti mints and so on within the farm, so.
No, it, it's, it's interesting, I think it's a fascinating topic. I love the idea of the motivational interviewing. Probably without realising it, I did it in my dermatology consults.
And, and having that extra time made a difference. I can really understand vets under pressure with 1015 minutes, it has to be to some degree more transactional. But maybe that compromise is for those vets and nurses listening, throwing in one or two open questions can help, and, and sometimes with difficult cases, maybe give two appointments and explain to the client that this will cost a bit more than.
An ordinary appointment, but we really want to get to grips with the problem is, is another way around it, and to, to explain the value of that. I, I think you're absolutely right, and I think, and again, I'm not saying motivational interviewing is one size that will fit all, but equally to your point, you know, maybe give two slots to a consultation. Because I think sometimes we assume that the, that the client, you know, just wants to be in there.
They're very conscious of the cost, etc. But actually, and I, I'm just thinking about from my, you know, from being on the other side, you know, when you take your animal into, to, to see the vet, you're sort of thinking it did feel quite transactional. Now, you know, you probably come out and you think, OK, well, it's achieved what I came in for, but actually to have the opportunity to have been asked more open questions, I think I would have felt more relaxed as well, so.
I think it's that don't assume that someone wants this, and I think your suggestion makes total sense. You know, it, it's an opportunity to add value and the outcome could be that the, the client feels more listened to and thinks, I'm, I'm gonna stay with this practise rather than perhaps if you're in an area with a lot of different practises, you know, you might think, oh, I might try that one down the road because my friend said they'd taken, you know, the dog and they, they seem to, to listen, so. Hm.
Fiona, it's been really interesting. I've, I've always enjoyed chatting to you in the past and that's been great. I, I think COVID sort of split a lot of relationships in different ways, didn't it?
And we've not really chatted during the pandemic, so it's been great to reconnect. Fascinating subject. It, it's so good to see vets staying with the profession, maybe not seeing clinical cases but still supporting.
Colleagues with skills like this which are massively important, so thanks for all that you're doing for the profession. Oh thanks for inviting me on Auntie, I've loved chatting with you as always. Thanks Fiona, and thanks everyone for listening.
This is Anthony Chadwick from the webinar vet, and this has been Vet Chat. Take care, bye bye.