Grief & Loss in Veterinary Medicine

Event Details

Euthanasia is an experience, not a procedure or event. The experience of the loss of an animal companion, no matter how dignified, well-planned, and peaceful, initiates a physiological, cognitive, and emotional process which is unique to the individual. This program explores the experience of loss not only for the human “pet parent,” but also for the other animals who shared in the life of the deceased. Humans and animals have parallel emotional circuitry built into the limbic system of the brain. There is much about the emotional experience of loss that we have in common with our animal companions. Listeners will be challenged to imagine foreign perspectives and re-think the human-animal bond, anthropomorphism, and mortality itself.

Speaker Bio 

Dave Shuey is a Licensed Master Social Worker, author, pianist, and equestrian. He works for Indevets, creating and providing wellness education and support to the relief veterinarian community, working to increase veterinarians’ professional health and fulfillment, and longevity in the profession. Dave also maintains a small clientele in private psychotherapy practice.

In his eleven years as a registered veterinary technician, Dave’s career evolved from small animal dentistry at a specialty hospital, to large animal anesthesia and emergency and critical care in a university teaching hospital, to joining the Animal Hospice and Palliative Care movement as practitioner and writer, to conference-speaking on equine end-of-life practice, to returning to graduate school to study human mental health and wellness.

Before returning to veterinary medicine with Indevets, Dave worked as an outpatient clinician in a community behavioral health agency, providing assessment, diagnosis, and individual and group psychotherapy for people with severe and persistent mental illness. He is the author of “The Human - Animal Bond and Euthanasia,” Chapter 37 in the 10th and 11th editions of McCurnin’s Clinical Textbook for Veterinary Technicians and Nurses.

Dave holds a Doctor of Musical Arts in piano performance, and gives solo recitals in public from time to time. He lives in the woods of central Georgia with his wife, cats, dog and horses.