The main emphasis is on the keyhole spay (laparoscopic ovariectomy). We can provide you with the skills to perform a spay through one 6mm and one 12mm hole, allowing a return to full exercise at 48 hours. This opens the door to a multitude of other laparoscopic and laparoscopically-assisted surgeries that significantly improve post-operative patient management and outcomes. These include lap cryptorchid, lap liver biopsy, lap pyometra, lap gastropexy, lap-assisted foreign body removal, lap-assisted cystotomy and more.

We can tailor your experience with MSM Vets to align with your current level of equipment, staff, skill-level and goals.

• Are you keen to learn lap spaying, but don’t know where to start? We can come to you, set up our kit and train you – see the 3-day start-up package option below
• Do you have all or some of the kit, but it’s just not being used to its full potential, or at all? We can advise on equipment, train new vets or nurses, or simply improve your skills and speed to maximise turnover – see our day-option below.
• Do you need a bespoke keyhole procedure performing in-house? Minimally invasive procedures hold such a benefit to the patient, that you may need to refer a client for clinical reasons. We can perform these procedures in-house on a peripatetic basis too. See the in-house procedure list below.

3 Day Start Up Package

With a combination of lectures, dry-lab training and in-vivo lap spaying, we hope to give a significant insight into the world of keyhole surgery over 3 days. This package is perfect if you currently have no gear but wish to bring keyhole surgery into your practice. Using our gear, we will train you on dry-lab trainers, teach the nurses equipment maintenance, and lecture you on keyhole procedures. Then we will progress to live lap spaying or other easily accessible lap procedures based on your current cases. We will also sit with managers to advise on both equipment purchase and appropriate pricing to ensure the investment pays for itself quickly.

An example of the format would be:

Day 1: Intro to the kit, the lap-spay process, training on the dry-trainer. 1 pre-booked lap spay (paying client, staff pet, charity dog are all fine) for a lap-spay demo.

Day 2: Two pre-booked lap-spays for in-house vets to commence in-vivo training (we would advise dogs on the younger and leaner side initially to ease you into the procedure. We would advise consent is obtained from paying clients to make them aware of the training nature of the spay)

Day 3: Two further pre-booked lap-spays or other lap procedures (cryptorchid, liver biopsy). Session with the managers to discuss purchase and pricing.

We also offer a shortened package of 2 days, and a pre-booked 5 day package where we return for 2 more days of training after you have completed the 3-day course and purchased the kit. These days are to ensure you are not too rusty, have the correct set-up, ensure the nurses know how to handle and clean the gear etc.

Day-option

Are you looking to improve your skills, or perhaps you’ve had a gap from lap-spaying and need to refresh your knowledge and handling? Do you have the gear lying around but have never used it? If so, we can tailor individual days to suit your needs.

We will come to you for a 1-day session and bring as much or as little extra kit as needed. We can provide dry-trainer sessions on the day before tackling live spays, improve your handling speed and case selection, train nurses on equipment maintenance and discuss with managers appropriate pricing structures.

In-house procedures (peripatetic services)

If you simply wish to have keyhole services provided within your practice we can accommodate you. Clients are becoming more aware and informed about available options for their pets and the number of requests for a procedure to performed ‘keyhole’ are on the rise.

We can also provide a regular ‘spay-day’ where we come in for routine lap-spaying or bespoke individual procedures from the following list:

Laparoscopic cryptorchid

Laparoscopic liver biopsy

Laparoscopic elective gastropexy

Laparoscopic pyometra surgery

Laparoscopically assisted cystotomy (males)

Laparoscopically assisted renal/pancreatic biopsy

Laparoscopically assisted foreign body removal

Laparoscopically assisted intestinal biopsy

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At MSM we can re-invigorate your love of scoping. The diagnostic and therapeutic possibilities for your patients are many. We can bring an array of scopes to your premises and train you in their use. We are also able to provide a peripatetic endoscopy service, meaning your clients don’t need to travel and you retain revenue.

Endoscopic training and in-house procedure based peripatetic services are available in:

Gastroscopy (and duodenoscopy) – Gastric and intestinal lesion diagnosis & biopsy, foreign body retrieval, investigations into chronic vomiting.

Bronchoscopy – Lesion diagnosis & biopsy, BAL diagnosis, investigations into chronic coughing.

Cystoscopy (and vaginoscopy) – Diagnosis of persistent cystitis or incontinence, lesion biopsies, identification of congenital abnormalities (ectopic ureters, paramesonephric remnants), small urolith identification & retrieval

Rhinoscopy – investigations into acute and chronic rhinitis, nasal discharge and sneezing. Diagnosis and biopsy of lesions, fully non-surgical aspergillosis treatment.

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The Veterinary Surgeons Act 1966 (Schedule 3 Amendment) Order 2002 states that Veterinary surgeons may direct registered veterinary nurses who they employ, to carry out limited veterinary surgery. It is the surgeon’s responsibility to be satisfied that the veterinary nurse is qualified to carry out the medical treatment or minor surgery. Without mentorship and a strong culture of quality improvement this relationship can be challenging to implement

The schedule 3 exemption allows qualified nurses, under the vet’s direction (student nurses must be continually supervised by a VS or RVN) to carry out procedures that do not enter a body cavity such as:

• Aural Haematomas

• Small/medium wound repair and management 

• Benign skin mass removals

• Drainage of subcutaneous abscesses

• Skin closure following surgery

• Naso-oesophageal tube placement

• Dental scale & polishing

• Non complicated, simple Tail tip amputation

There is flexibility to how we mentor. We can tailor individual or group sessions to make things cost effective. A typical program would include:

Suture training and principles of instrumentation.

Surgical approaches and management of haemostasis

Anatomical considerations for the listed surgeries

How to introduce nurse surgery into practice

Surgical efficiency, reflection and system refinement

E-mail MSM Vets today to discuss mentorship solutions for the nursing team.

Surgery is a privilege most people don’t get to experience. Do you find it daunting? Would you love to do more but just can’t make the jump without someone there to help? Have you been ‘out of the game’ for a while with a young family?

That is what we are here for. We are the place to turn to when you just need to have your confidence bolstered for a bit! There is no need to be self conscious, we have mentored cat castrates through to open chest surgery and have helped all abilities along the way. We believe surgery belongs in general practice.

We would suggest that you aim to book us to come in when you know your surgical caseload is moderately busy. The more practical assistance the better. We are happy if it’s a list of routine neutering, or a variation of procedures – whatever you are hoping to improve.

Please contact us to discuss your needs. We can tailor days to suit you

Working smarter is far easier than working harder!

Quality improvement through clinical governance is fundamental to improving surgical outcomes. At MSM Vets we actively encourage a systems theory approach to the surgical routine. We offer on site training to empower the team and to engage a culture where mistakes are embraced and learned from rather than ignored and repeated. Quality improvement can save your practice money and allow team members to rationalise success and failure, promoting engagement and retention.

Every surgical facility needs clinical governance and quality improvement. This isn’t fusty box ticking, this is fascinating self evaluation and iterative systematic improvement. We bring governance to life and make it essential to your practice culture so both your patient outcomes and profits can fly!

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We know about the financial challenges of practice. Having grown a surgical team and caseload it is easy to spend a lot of money on CPD but still not feel confident to make the leap and try on your own. By reflecting and growing a safety orientated culture we can help you overcome the barriers and become an amazing surgical team