Consulting Services
How can we support you?
Our team has visited over 100 animal shelters and created protocols, training, and other materials for over 70 shelters, rescues, and access to care organizations. Members of our team have also spent many years working for animal shelters internally in a variety of positions, from front desk volunteer to medical director. Through our mobile practice, we regularly provide primary care and telemedicine for companion animals in shelter and community medicine settings. We have taught and trained hundreds of people, including shelter staff, veterinary technicians, veterinarians, and veterinary students.
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Through working with shelters in Canada, the United States, and Australia, we know that while each shelter is unique, some challenges feel universal! These include balancing increasingly complex animal needs and community expectations with available resources, finding time to create shelter and foster protocols and staff training materials, and staying on top of the latest recommendations for everything from infectious disease management to facility design.
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Our experience gives us a unique perspective on sheltering systems and the people and animals within them. When collaborating with shelters, we always centre animal welfare while seeking to make things easy and clear for staff and volunteers and being considerate of organizational resources.
Customize protocols for your shelter, rescue, or access to care program
These include a variety of topics such as specific infectious diseases, intake exams and preventive care, dosing charts, sanitation, biosecurity, feeding, pathway decision-making, behaviour, high quality high volume spay/neuter, community programs, and more!
Provide virtual or in-person training
For new staff and refreshers for existing staff. Via webinars, videos, workshops, and content for e-learning platforms on any shelter topic.
Help your team enhance operations
We listen, and then help you step-by-step as you work to determine and stay within your capacity for humane care, streamline pathway planning and decision-making, make adoptions and reunifications faster and more equitable, and achieve other operational goals.
Offer peer support
For RVTs and veterinarians, from new grads to team members who just transitioned from general practice to those working as a solo RVT or DVM for a shelter or rescue… we’ve been there, and we can help as virtual mentors.
Create foster program materials
We advise on operations, generate training manuals and videos for staff and foster volunteers, write health protocols (e.g. for bottle feeding, kitten diarrhea, etc.), and help with troubleshooting.
Write handouts and web content for adopters and the public
These are customized to your topic and audience at varying reading levels, including adoption waivers and disclosures for common conditions, handouts explaining shelter policies, blog posts about current issues, and more!
Support facility design
From small renos to new builds, we analyze data and learn about your organization and community, and then facilitate discussion and recommendations on everything from capacity planning to housing design to materials.
Help during a crisis
We try our best to accept short-notice requests from shelters experiencing outbreaks, and can assist you in gathering data, creating a plan, and communicating internally and externally to stop disease in its tracks while maximizing continuing operations.
Specific ways we can help
We share a deep love for the animals and people in shelters. We know that you are an expert on your animals, shelter, and community. We partner with you so you have more time and tools to do what you do best- support your community!
Interested in learning more? Contact us to chat via e-mail or set up a free initial 30-60 minute video call to share your thoughts and explore what working together could look like!