Is Your Pet Sitter a PSI Pet Sitter?

This weekend I was honored to attend the Pet Sitters International (PSI) annual convention "Quest for Excellence".  There, I gave a speech called "Worms, Bites, and Scratches Oh My! Occupational Safety for Pet Sitters." Learn more about how I got involved with this group in this post: "The Complicated Contracts of Dog Walkers Continued"

These pet sitters' kindness and passion for animals absolutely blew me away and I had to tell you more about this organization.

What is Pet Sitters International? It is the largest professional group of pet sitters, run and founded by Patti Moran author of Pet Sitting for Profit.

We have a similar organization in veterinary medicine. Veterinarians who want to excel and hold themselves to a high standard seek American Animal Hospital Association (AAHA) membership and accreditation.

Pet sitters who want to be the best join PSI and become PSI Certified Professional Pet Sitters (CPPS).

PSI provides education to member pet sitters through free monthly webinars, their Pet Sitters World magazine, and Quest, the conference I just attended. Ranging from business education to Pet First Aid certifications, PSI resources help pet sitters run their businesses better and keep the pets safer.

PSI makes background checks, insurance, and bonding available to their pet sitters so pet owners know they are dealing with someone they can trust.

But PSI members aren't just skilled, they are also compassionate.

PSI wants to leave a positive "pawprint" on each city that hosts their convention. Every year, the Quest conference puts on a charity auction and chooses a local non-profit shelter or humane society to receive all the proceeds.

Not only was the charity auction a BLAST - Rob the Auctioneer and Owner of Decadent Dog in Nedham, MA had us barking on command and singing rounds of "How Much is that Doggy in the Window" - but the amount of money they were able to raise was mind-blowing.

Since they started doing their charity auctions they have raised more than $105,000 for animal charities.

Pet sitters are not known for rolling in dough but in 3 hours I saw a group of about 150 pet sitters raise $15,115 for charity. They were bidding $300 on a $99 set of animal pillows for the fun of it and for the benefit of pets in need. Or over $500 for a $120 set of cat toys.

The auction even made the local news - see the coverage here or in the video box below.

After working with this group, I would highly recommend choosing a PSI pet sitter for your pet. My next blog entry will be about how to choose a pet sitter. In the meantime check out PSI's directory at http://www.petsit.com/locate/


(You might spot me around 1:28)

Worlds Vets Textbook Drive

Earlier this year after seeing these great videos (here and here) by Dr. V of Pawcurious and Dr. Andy Roark I went to our local veterinary medical association to organize our own local textbook drive.

These books help World Vets, an organization that provides veterinary relief across the world. Anyone can help this organization, even if you don't have veterinary textbooks, by volunteering or donating needed supplies.

I worked with our local veterinary medical association president on the project. We found that it was fun, easier than we expected, and brought together our local community of veterinarians.

Here's what we did:

1 month prior: Faxed flyer to all practices in our local veterinary association telling them about the book drive and discussed it at our monthly meeting.

1 week prior: Called hospitals and asked if they had any books to donate and reminded them when we were coming to pick up books. About half the hospitals we called were still unsure whether they were donating, but the phone call reminded them to check with their doctors.

If they did not have any books to donate, we told them we would repeat the drive next year and to hang onto any unneeded books in the future.

1 day prior: Called hospitals that were not sure if they had books to donate. Set up final pick up schedule.

Day of Pick Up: Drove to hospitals and picked up books. Boxed them in banker's boxes (file size boxes available at most office supply stores) and shipped. Many shipping companies give discounts if all your boxes are the same size, and these boxes are perfectly sized for textbooks.

Zoetis Animal Health generously paid for shipping.

Overall it was a great experience.

If you're interested in running a drive yourself you can get more details at the World Vets Textbook Drive website.

Has anyone else run a similar drive? How did yours go? Were there any pitfalls you would avoid or any unique ideas that helped?

Practice Like the Best

Practice Like the Best

Last year Veterinary Team Brief asked me to write a set of articles about how veterinarians can adapt some of the best practices of companies like the Mayo Clinic, Starbucks, Apple, and Southwest, to their clinics.

I learned so much while writing these. The most fascinating part was how the Mayo Clinic emphasizes practicing medicine and making medical decisions as a team.

You can find the articles in the May/June issue of Veterinary Team Brief and here online.

How Riley Changed My World

Two weeks ago, my fiance and I put Riley, our amazing 11 year old, orange, fluffy, lionesque border collie mix, to sleep.

The word "heartbroken" has never felt so shallow.

Riley was the happiest dog. His previous owners called him "smiley Riley" and a wave of his curvy, fluffy tail drew you magnetically from across the room. He would gently lay his head your lap if you sat beside him. I was teaching him to "give kisses" before he got sick.

I still expect to hear his collar jingling up the stairs when I come home.

Riley reminded me of a pet's power to change our world.

He reminded me why I'm a vet.

In his memory, I'd like to share 3 lessons Riley taught me.

Complicated Contracts Of Dog Walkers Continued

After my last post, I was able to reach out to Pet Sitters International (PSI) with the guide Kim Fields, Chris Wooten, and I developed to help educate and protect pet sitters.

After reading my "Complicated Contracts of Dog Walkers" post, the PSI president Patti Morgan put me in touch with an expert on insuring pet sitters, Mr. David Pearsall of Business Insurers of the Carolinas. Mr. Pearsall has been working with PSI for a decade to protect pet sitters and pet owners.

He was able to give me some additional insights into these complicated contracts.

Animal Safety Pt. 3

Here is the next installment of the Animal Safety series. This document is adapted from the Pet Sitter Safety Handout I, Kim Fields, and Chris Wooten created. Learn more about what inspired this document in my blog The Complicated Contracts of Dog Walkers.

I have just learned I will be speaking at the Pet Sitters International conference in September in North Carolina on these topics.

Our last post (Animal Safety Pt. 2) discussed how to identify pets that are scared or agressive. In this installment we discuss how to safely handle scared or aggressive pets.

Animal Safety Pt. 2

This is the next installment in our animal safety series inspired by my mission to keep pet sitters safer on the job.

Animal Safety Part 1 talked about how to protect yourself from pet diseases. Below we will talk about how to identify scared or aggressive pets.