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Thursday, March 6, 2008

A Pig Person


The other day Dr. Pink Pinkerton and I woke up to this nasty message;

Hello:

I ran into your site and was horrified to see someone catering TCVM over the internet that does not have a license! Your are not a licensed veterinarian are you? Your are not certified in TCVM are you? What are you doing on line selling herbs? Are you a licensed veterinarin in California with a Certification in TCVM???????????????????

I am downloading all of your pages and contacting the Oregon and california Veterinary medcial Boards about you practicing without a license!

Sincerely,
Patricia Jordan DVM,CVA,CTCVM & Herbology

Here is our response back to this nasty person;

Hi Patricia,
Can you please refer me to the law or the legislation where it states that you can not sell herbs on line? And aren't there about 1000 sites that sell herbs for pets on the Internet?
Why do you feel that I am doing something different than say a company called Pet Alive, or any of the other herb companies that are there when you do searches for things such as pet herbs etc.....?
I would appreciate the information.

Here is her response back to that message;

You are selling herbs for diagnosed conditions and therefore practicing veterinary medicine without a license. refer to the california veterinary medical practice act. By selling them over the internet, you are also practicing in any state that you send herbs that you are claiming will treat those dignoses! I will forward this information to the AVMA.

Sincerely,
Patricia Jordan DVM,CVA,CTCVM & Herbology

What a nasty person...those are the only words I can think of. And look at all of those spelling errors....do you really think that this is a doctor? I wonder if it just a nut case?

Anyway, I didn't get into the fact that I most likely had a zillion more hours of TCM study that she did...she is a certified TCM vet. What this means is that she takes about 120 hours of instruction, and then she thinks she is an expert.

"
The National Commission for the Certification
of Acupuncture and Oriental Medicine provides the course accepted by most
states. It comprises 1,725 hours (most veterinary programs offer less than one-
tenth of that). "

I have thousands of hours of TCM study, she does not....and I could never imagine surfing the net, and looking for people who do what I do, and then making it my mission to send them a nasty e-mail and do all the nasty things that she says she is going to do. Which by the way is fine with me....Go ahead lady...

What I think is sad, is that it makes it hard for pet owners to get good TCM for their pets because the Vets are trying to keep all TCM in their arena...weather they are qualified or not.

Its all about the money honey.

I am an acupuncturist...that means I can do it on humans...but get this; not on dogs or cats...

Why is this? Because the Vets have lobbied to keep this practice all to themselves. They take a seminar of 120 hours, and they call themselves a TCM practitioner.

What a crock of crap.

Since Dr. Pink Pinkerton and I want to eventually open up retail stores for affordable holistic pet care, we did some research about the regulatory considerations for complimentary alternative veterinary medicine (CAVM).

I paid for a study that was extremely interesting...for anyone who wants to read what pigs these veterinarians can be here is the link to the study

Regulatory Condiderations

The upshot of this 17 page document is this;
"Attempting to restrict the practice of every single conceivable modality to
veterinarians has the potential for making veterinarians look like bullies trying
to pick on the new kids in the neighborhood. Virtually anyone can provide
emotional support in times of crisis. Attempts to regulate such support would
seem to be futile—indeed, they might rather be viewed as shortsighted, as
they might induce conflict between the professional and client and force the
client to choose between a compassionate layperson and a veterinarian who is
perceived as having “poor bedside manner.”

NO KIDDING...what a friggin bully!



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1 comment:

Anne said...

Good morning --
I am new to blogging, so I apologize in advance if I trip over any of the "unspoken rules" :)

I'll tell you up front -- I am a veterinarian, and I am just starting to learn about complementary medicine and alternative therapies (which is one of the most amazing things I've done in my 15 year veterinary career). I am not interested in commenting about any of the regulatory issues raised in this post -- I hope that I do not offend you, but I am only writing to rebuke you for the tone of your response. I'll agree that Dr. Jordan's post was very aggressive and was not as tactfully phrased as I might have liked -- shame on her for that. But were your response and subsequent comments really any better? Did you stop to consider that perhaps this practitioner has had to treat pets who have been harmed by some yahoo claiming to have sufficient knowledge to use herbs for the benefit of a pet? Could you not have offered her some indication of your training and experience beyond the snide remark of having had "a zillion more hours of TCM study than she did"? After all, a "zillion" hours of studying TCM may not amount to much if the required reading comes from fortune cookies and lay magazines ... How about ackowledging the four years of study necessary to become a licensed veterinarian?

To be considered a professional, I believe you should act like one (and that is directed at you AND Dr. Jordan) -- and, not to get all biblical, but in the spirit of "she without sin casting the first stone", I found six spelling errors on your homepage. I do not write that to be mean, but, just from the standpoint of accuracy, I would think you would check something like that so that you don't look slightly foolish later on ...

I would like to think that this is a site I could use to further my knowledge of this astonishing information; I guess your reactions to my post will determine that.

Please remember that our goal is to help pets -- alternative or traditional, Eastern or Western. Catty little exchanges like that one will only serve to divide us.

Sincerely,
Anne Taylor, DVM