Collaborative medicine is the best way to do medicine, says Benjamin Bergstrom, DVM, MS, DACVO.
Benjamin Bergstrom, DVM, MS, DACVO, owner of The Eye Vets in Nashville, Tennessee, shares a piece of advice for all veterinary professionals: advocating for collaborative medicine and emphasizing the importance of open communication among veterinarians, regardless of their specialty. “There’s no such thing as a silly question,” he said.
Below is the transcript of the video, which has been lightly edited for clarity:
Benjamin Bergstrom, DVM, MS, DACVO: The best piece of advice is: collaborative medicine, I truly believe, is the best medicine. [This] means, as an ophthalmologist, if I have a patient that comes in with a heart condition and we have to consider putting this animal under general anesthesia, I'm going to reach out to a cardiologist to ask what's going to be the most appropriate protocol for this animal under general anesthesia.
That's collaborative medicine. That's the best way to do medicine. If you're a general practitioner or you're a specialist outside of ophthalmology, and you have a question about eyes, and it doesn't immediately make sense—what's going on in front of you or how you should manage it—reach out to an ophthalmologist.
One of my favorite things to do as a practitioner and now as a business owner is to communicate with general practitioners through text, through quick emails, through phone calls because I think we support each other, they support us. I love to be able to support them.
And there's no such thing as a silly question. If you have a question about how you're managing something, reach out. And I don't believe that's only true for me. I believe that's true for a lot of veterinarians out there. We all want to help each other and so let's lean on each other.