[Lakewood, Colorado—February 25, 2021]—A large number of veterinary associations have started a new collaboration called Veterinary Visionaries to bring their collective memberships together to share ideas, co-create solutions, and unify our industry’s approach to solving shared challenges.

The American Animal Hospital Association (AAHA) is joined by the American Association of Veterinary State Boards, the American College of Veterinary Internal Medicine, the American Veterinary Medical Association, and many other state and national associations in this unique initiative. See the full list at aaha.org/visionaries.

Co-Creating the Future Together

The veterinary industry is highly fragmented with hundreds of associations and nonprofits. While each serves a great purpose, that fragmentation hampers the co-creation and sharing of useful solutions to shared challenges.

“The ‘why’ of Veterinary Visionaries is simple. We believe members of our veterinary associations share a variety of difficult challenges for which they can be better served by a broad, coordinated, and inclusive approach to solving,” said AAHA CEO Garth Jordan, MBA, CSM, CSPO.

In the long term, Veterinary Visionaries will build a community and programs that work toward solutions to big issues such as addressing a lack of diversity in the profession and ongoing public health concerns, as well as strategically planning for opportunities such as telehealth, including advanced technology and AI, and keeping pace with evolving veterinary science.

“Our first event is only a baby step, a practice-run to get us used to working in a large collaborative space as a coalition of like-minded associations. From here, we will begin marching toward an open and diverse community, helping our members solve shared challenges of our industry together. This is not just about virtual conferences, but about facilitating solving in a more inclusive way.

We encourage every veterinary association to join our collaborative effort so our collective memberships can work on Grand Challenges together. We believe co-creation is the best way for us to make industry-wide progress,” said Jordan.

Veterinary Visionaries: Changemakers 2021

For its inaugural event, Veterinary Visionaries is hosting a free virtual gathering on April 7 (12:00 pm to 3:00 pm Eastern time), open to anyone in the profession. Three 50-minute sessions will celebrate the unsung heroes of 2020, highlighting first-hand stories of veterinary hospital team members who made critical decisions at≥≤  the moment and have continued every day since to reimagine the profession over the past year.

“Crisis caused the acute response, but leaders caused lasting change,” said AAHA Chief Medical Officer, Heather Loenser, DVM. “With this event, we aim to provide tangible, practical advice from actual veterinary teams who rose above 2020 and changed how they worked together now, as well as how their practices will do things in the future.”

See session descriptions and get the free registration link at aaha.org/visionaries. #seethechange

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About Veterinary Visionaries

Established in 2021, Veterinary Visionaries is a collaboration of veterinary associations bringing their collective memberships together to share ideas, co-create solutions, and unify our industry’s approach to solving shared challenges. Learn more at aaha.org/visionaries.

About AAHA

Since 1933, the American Animal Hospital Association has been the only organization to accredit veterinary hospitals throughout the US and Canada according to more than 900 standards directly correlated to high-quality medicine and compassionate care. Accreditation in veterinary medicine is voluntary. The AAHA-accredited logo is the best way to know a practice has been evaluated by a third-party. Look for the AAHA logo or visit aaha.org.