Worldwide Veterinary Service

Since its foundation in 2003, WVS or Worldwide Veterinary Service has gone from strength to strength. Jenny Moffett looks at how successfully the worlds of volunteerism and veterinary care can interact. What does charity mean to you? From sponsored skipathons and bungee jumps to an annual Concern donation or copies of the Big Issues, charity often boils down to the basic question. “How much money can you spare?” But, what of the other resources people have to offer, such as time and experience? Veterinary professionals have several important skills that are often taken for granted and can be incredibly valuable, especially where they are most required.

Luke Gamble, a Bristol University veterinary graduate, has recognised this wealth of untapped veterinary talent. In 2003, he set up WVS (Worldwide Veterinary Service), an organisation that aims to match veterinary resources with the people, places and animals that need them most. The registered UK charity, which is based in Hampshire, is funded mainly by volunteer subscriptions and now aims to help scores of charities worldwide from Singapore and Venezula, to Greece and Romania.

There is no such thing as a ‘typical’ WVS trip. Volunteers can find themselves anywhere from a boat on the Amazon to a Tibetan monastery in southern India. WVS funds travel and accommodation expenses for some of the trips, others are largely self-funded by the voluteers. The common theme is that their veterinary skills are used to their fullest potential. In an interview with the Irish Veterinary Journal, Luke tells us the WVS ’story so far’.

What was the inspiration behind WVS?
I wanted to inject the idealism back into my career; something which I felt was getting eroded in the commercial environment of private practice. I really enjoy being a vet, so aside from the ‘feel-good’ factor of working with charitable projects, the challenge and variety of WVS work also completely re-energises me. It reminds me of all the reasons why I chose this career in the first place.

WVS has grown considerably in its first few years. What stage have you reached?
Yes, in three years we’ve gone from trying to help around 5 charities, to having over 75 registered with us. Unfortunately we aren’t yet in a position to help them all, but the grand plan is to provide a sustainable veterinary resource and develop our network so that we have five or six teams going out on projects each month. At the moment we have about 800 vets and nurses registered, with an average of two to three teams heading off each month.

How do you choose which charities to support?
All charities are in need and have stories to melt the hardest heart. It’s very difficult to choose, and the decision is based on logistics: how organised the charity requiring help is? What financial input is required from us? Are projects geographically accessible and can get teams to go out?

What attributes does a volunteer need? Do you need vets and nurses?
Absolutely, and they are equally valued. We also welcome trained, non-veterinary volunteers who are essential in helping run an efficient team. Attributes vary according to the specific trip, but generally we need people who are enthusiastic, hard working, good fun and have a real understanding of what we are trying to achieve. We aren’t limited by specialities or geographical location and we have members from all over the world. In February of this year, for example, we organised a Canadian team to go to Venezuela.

How do you ensure a good match between workers and placements?
We send packs out to all volunteers who are interested in a particular trip and try to match their skills and experience and ensure that the team mix is well-balanced. Some placements can be tricky, particularly helping a charity for the first time (like Botswana this summer, or trips to Iquitos in the Amazon), when no-one knows what to expect. We try to send our seasoned volunteers on these sorts of adventures!

Where are the most unusual places you have sent volunteers?
One of our volunteers, Alan Wynde, has probably has the most exotic trip. He went to Bhutan and ended up neutering the royal family’s dogs! Others have worked with confiscated, smuggled, exotic animals in Indonesia and trained local vets in wildlife and zoo medicine. All WVS trips turn out to be fairly unusual one way or another – you don’t often go to the Canary Islands and end up in an apartment neutering cats!

Which, of all the projects, are most memorable for you?
Although I’ve enjoyed the challenge of all the projects with equal zeal, I think the first trips to new places are the best. You build up a trust with the charity you are helping and form a really strong bond with what they are trying to achieve, which is often at phenomenal, selfless expense to their own financial, and in some circumstances, health, situations.

The humanitarian aspects of the projects are also something that I value tremendously. By reducing the prevalence of leishmaniasis or rabies in a community, I know I am helping on a humanitarian level in a way that not many other people can. Also, by fixing a donkey on which a family utterly depend, for getting water or taking goods to market, I know I am directly benefitting them.

Where do you source most of your veterinary drugs?
We are extremely fortunate to be principally sponsored by Bayer, who send us vast quantities of their products. We receive all of their short-dated stock, which we can distribute globally. Just last month, for example, their products went to Greece, Ibiza and Sri Lanka. It really does make a difference. There are other companies who’ve been extremely generous. Safavet, for example, sent us three pallets-worth of equipment and Fort Dodge has donated a large amount of dog vaccines. The Marchig Trust has also been very generous and bought all the drugs for a trip to SOS Almeria, in Spain. As with every charity though, we always need more! We are always desperately short of injectable anaesthetics, suture material and NSAIDs.

Where is the majority of your funding from? Do you get any help from the government or other bodies?
Not yet but I’m working on it! Subscriptions are the mainstay of our money – just 400 members paying £2.75 (4 euros) a month will generate £12,000 (17,500 euros) a year – we can do a huge amount with that sort of money. The cost of taking on staff and administration is, at the moment, funded by a personal loan until the charity is big enough to support it. It is a chicken-and-egg situation to get these things going and the workload requires a permanent employee to help run things.

There have been a lot of changes at WVS, including the appointment of full-time staff and an updated website. What do you see as the next steps?
There is a huge list of plans and ambitions for the charity but, as everyone keeps telling me “one step at a time!” We need to expand our active membership as the main priority – not to mention raise some money!

WVS is open to Irish volunteers and Luke wants to welcome more of these “great fun” and “valuable” team members. James Casey is one such willing WVS worker. A 1993 UCD graduate, James went out to the Greek Island of Samos with WVS in 2003. James, originally from Longford and now working as a Veterinary Inspector with Galway Co. Council, says that the trip was a great experience: “I got to help out in situations where I was needed and felt I was able to give my professional expertise. I have an interest in the control of stay dogs and wild animals, so this was almost an extension of my job in Galway at an international level. I was able to bring some ideas out there as well, which was very satisfying”. James trip, which involved rehoming as well as neutering dogs and cats under a trap-neuter-release programme, worked alongside a South African nurse and a Scottish vet. As James remarks, WVS is professionally run: “It is a veterinary-led organisation and that was one of the reasons I chose them. I felt that a lot of welfare organisations that are not veterinary-led find it difficult to keep a veterinary perspective”.

If you feel you’ve got what it takes to be a WVS volunteer then visit www.wvs.org.uk and sign up. Within the members’ area you will find details of upcoming trips which, in May, include working with small animal projects in Turkey and Romania and the Gambia Horse and Donkey Trust. Membership costs £2.75 (4 euros)a month or £30 (43euros) a year and is open to everyonee, including vets, veterinary nurses, students and non-vets. WVS also welcomes simple donations and Luke has recently raised over £4,000 (5,700euros) himself, again with Bayer a major sponsor; by entering the 2006 Marathon des Sables. At time of press, Luke had abandoned the charms of newly wedded bliss and headed off to race across 151 miles of Saharan desert, carrying a 25kg backpack, in heats of 120oF! Luke hopes the extreme challenge will raise funds and increase awareness of WVS. However, there is a personal goal at stake too and for Luke, not a man to do things by halves. “wimping out at any point” is not an option.