A Veterinary Fenomenon

When we visit a veterinary clinic today, the doctor examining our pet will likely be female because women now make up the majority of the veterinary workforce. According to the American Veterinary Medical Association (AVMA), in 2023, of the 127,131 employed veterinarians in the United States, approximately 67% (85,337) were female and 32% (41,253) were male. The predominance of women in the field, however, is a relatively new development.

According to one study, in 1960, 98% of the veterinarians in the U.S. were male, but by 2000, census data indicated that  34% (15,000) were female. This shift in labor demographics, referred to as the feminization of a profession, is not unique to veterinary medicine. The percentage of women in many science and technology fields has increased in recent years.  None, however, have seen as dramatic a flip in the ratio of male to female workers as veterinary medicine. Why and how has this shift occurred, and what are its ramifications for the industry?

Why are so many women entering the veterinary profession?
As shown in Figure 1, according to the Association American of Veterinary Medical Colleges (AAVMC), since 1980, the number of women applying to U.S. veterinary schools has consistently increased, while the number of male applicants has dropped precipitously. This alone would account for the increasing number of women in the field, assuming acceptance rates were similar.

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What factors influenced the increase in female applications to veterinary schools?
Reduced barriers to admission were major factors. Historically, veterinary colleges either excluded females entirely from their classes or had very low enrollment caps. For example, in 1963, Texas A&M, the last remaining university to exclude women from veterinary classes, changed its enrollment policy after the state legislature mandated it. However, prior to 1972, when Title IX, the civil rights law prohibiting discrimination based on sex in federally funded education programs, was passed, Cornell University had a two women cap on yearly enrollment. So, to some extent, women started entering the profession of veterinary medicine because they could.

Why are fewer males applying to veterinary school?
While increased applications and enrollment of women explains part of the demographic changes in veterinary medicine, a decrease in the number of males applying was also an important factor in the feminization of the industry. (Figure 1) Male applications to medical school have also recently decreased, but only slightly. According to the Association of American Medical Colleges (AAMC), since 1980, male applications to medical schools have fluctuated but there has been a fairly consistent downward trend since 2015. In contrast, female applications have increased fairly consistently since 1980, and in 2017, more than half of the applicants were female. (Figure 2) If the current trends continue, it will be interesting to see if human medicine eventually becomes a female dominated profession similar to veterinary medicine.

Why males find veterinary medicine a less desirable career now, as opposed to 40 years ago, is hard to answer. A 2010 study found that a decline in men’s college graduation rates and their avoidance of fields dominated by women were contributing factors to the decrease in male applications to veterinary school. In that same study, however, the lack of growth in average salaries for all veterinarians compared to other professions was also listed as a contributing factor. (Figure 3) Since that study was published, wages for newly-minted veterinarians have increased, but established veterinary salaries have remained fairly flat according to the AVMA (Figure 4). Veterinary student debt has also increased over the last 20 years from an average of over $60,000 in 2001 to around $180,000 in 2022. Stagnant wages and increased debt are significant because there is some evidence males prioritize potential long term salary opportunities more than women. In summary, there are a lot of theories but no definitive answers to the exodus of males from veterinary schools.

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Are there any ramifications of the feminization of veterinary medicine?
Women now make up the majority of the veterinary workforce, and given that current veterinary classes are majority female, they likely will for the foreseeable future. Is this a problem for the industry or a positive development? Historically, occupations with a higher percentage of female workers pay less than those with fewer females. In addition, using census data from 1950 to 2000, one study found a correlation between an increase of females in a profession and a decrease in salary even after controlling for education, work experience, skills, race and geography. By contrast, while the workforce of computer programmers was once primarily female,  an increase in salaries occurred as more males entered the field. One problem with these types of analyses, however, is that they are correlations and do not prove causation. Perhaps fewer men applied to veterinary medicine because they noticed that salaries were stagnating. Women may have been less concerned about salaries because the profession still represented a better opportunity than they had had previously. In a similar manner, perhaps males entered the field of computer programing once salaries started to increase. All together it is hard to know whether salary stagnation is a cause, an effect, or a coincidence of the male flight from the veterinary profession.

Is lack of diversity an issue for the veterinary profession?
One ongoing concern is the lack of diversity among veterinarians. For years, veterinary schools have been trying to attract students that were underrepresented in their classes, such as Hispanic and Black candidates. The premise has been that we can provide better service to our clients, and thus their pets, if our workforce better reflects society as a whole. The value of diversity in the workplace has been demonstrated in multiple studies. For example, one study found that companies with more diverse executive teams outperformed their less diverse peers financially. In addition, research by the World Economic Forum demonstrated that companies with above-average diversity scores were more innovative and successfully launched more new products, than less diverse companies.

Veterinary medicine has made some workforce gains in the area of diversity.  As shown in Figure 5, the percentage of ethnic and racial minorities made up less than 5% of veterinary students in U.S. schools in 1980, but in the graduating class of 2025 they will make up over 25%, which more closely reflects the diversity of the U.S. population.

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With progress made increasing the representation of racial and ethnic minorities in the workforce, veterinary medicine now must decide if lack of white males must also be considered. White males make up 30% of the population, and if diversification efforts aim to make the profession reflect the population more accurately, it would seem this issue should be addressed.

Veterinary medicine faces a number of challenges in the coming years including stagnating salaries, increasing fees, and recently decreasing visits from pet owners. The industry must decide how to prioritize these issues and determine where the feminization of the industry fits in its hierarchy.

– Cindy Cole, DVM, PhD, DACVCP

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First Five
First Five is our curated list of articles, studies, and publications for the month
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Six Farmers walk into a pub…
It isn’t the lead for a joke, it is how the Pig Improvement Company (PIC) came into being in the White Hart pub in Nettlebed, Oxfordshire in 1962. Over the last few decades, the company has improved feed-to-pork conversion efficiency by close to 30 per cent. This improvement, which was largely achieved using genomic science to identify relationships between specific genes and desirable characteristics in the pigs, has also been credited with a 7.7 per cent reduction in the greenhouse gas emissions associated with a pig’s full life cycle compared to the European industry average. PIC is one of the first companies to show that improvements in production and can also decrease environmental impacts.

Cutting edge teeth
Sabre teeth are exceptionally long, sharp canines that tend to be slightly flattened and curved, rather than rounded. Such teeth have evolved independently at least five times in mammals, and fossils of sabre-tooth predators have been found around the globe. A recent study that examined  the canines of 95 carnivorous mammalian species, including 25 sabre-toothed ones, sought to understand why sabre teeth kept re-evolving. Using smaller, 3D-printed versions of each tooth, researchers evaluated their performance in puncture tests, in which the teeth were mechanically pushed into gelatine blocks designed to mimic the density of animal tissue. They found that the sabre teeth were much better at puncturing than normal canines, but they were more fragile. Researchers surmised that sabre teeth were an evolutionary advantage when other large mammals were the primary prey, but as the prey population changed to smaller species, about the size of today’s rabbits, the teeth became hinderance as they were more likely to break.

Vaccines and Veterinarians
In a recent national survey of 2,853 dog owners and 1,977 cat owners, 62.9% of dog and 61.2% of cat owners indicated they trusted their veterinarians to provide the best vaccine advise for their pet. Most of these pet owners indicated they had good relationships with their veterinarian, had not avoided or delayed vaccinations, understood the severity of pet diseases, supported their veterinarian’s recommended vaccine schedule, and did not self-identify as vaccine hesitant (VH). However, the survey also identified 21.7% of dog and 25.9% of cat owners that did identify themselves as vaccine hesitant, and these owners were less likely to view their veterinarian as the best source of vaccine advise. While most pet owners trust their veterinarians regarding vaccine information, a substantial minority do not, and this could have implications for pet and human health and welfare.

Dogs, anxiety, and pressure wraps
Dogs can develop anxiety disorders including increased reactivity toward loud noises associated with fireworks, thunderstorms, and other loud noises. Other common anxiety conditions suffered by dogs include generalized anxiety disorder and separation anxiety. These anxious episodes can be debilitating with negative impacts on the welfare of the animal and increases in owner stress. There are several commercially available pressure wraps, as well as homemade approaches, that have been proposed to decrease or alleviate anxiety in dogs. These wraps are applied snugly around the dog’s thorax prior to anticipated episodes of anxiety, Recently a systematic review of the scientific literature was conducted to determine the efficacy of these products and approaches. Although over 200 studies on pressure wraps were identified, only four met the inclusion criteria primarily due to inadequate blinding of investigators and/or pet owners. Of the studies determined to be adequately designed, minimal benefits on behavior and heart rate were identified during anxiety inducing episodes. The review suggests there is weak and limited evidence to support the beneficial effect of pressure wraps in reducing physiological or behavioral signs of anxiety in dogs. Pet owners should consult their veterinarians on behavioral and pharmacological approaches that have been shown to have positive effects on anxieties of various origins in dogs.

Like kids and a garden hose
Many of us will remember as kids tormenting our siblings and friends by kinking or stepping on the garden hose they were trying to use. It appears that elephants exhibit some of this same behaviors, while also employing impressive tool using abilities. A recent study examined water-hose tool use in Asian zoo elephants. Individual elephants differed markedly in their water-hose handling. One female elephant, for example, displayed sophisticated hose-showering behaviors, which allowed her to systematically shower her entire body. The elephant, called Mary, usually grasped the hose behind the tip, using it as a stiff shower head. However, a younger female elephant regularly engaged in hose antics whenever Mary was showering. She would pull on the water hose, lifting and kinking it, then regrasping and compressing the kink repeatedly. The efficacy of water flow disruption increased over time. The second elephant was also observed performing an on-hose trunk stand, which also disrupted water flow. The researchers did not comment on Mary’s response to the other elephant’s antics, but they concluded that elephants show sophisticated hose tool use and manipulation, rather like kids.

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