The PAWEDcast: Veterinary Rehabilitation and Therapy 

We are so glad it helped you! Good luck with your career!

Dr. Hornberger in this video is a veterinarian (DVM) who got additional certification in canine rehabilitation. Veterinary rehabilitation is a different job to physical therapist. To become an animal physical therapist you would go to 4 years of undergrad and then a physical therapy program and become licensed, and then certified in animal PT. To become a canine rehabilitation therapist, you would need 4 years of undergraduate, 4 years of veterinary medical school, internship, and then the rehabilitation certification course. Alternatively, you can become a canine rehabilitation technician. Veterinary technicians are much like human nurses but perform more procedures. As a veterinary technician, you would also have choices in specializing in a specific area like rehabilitation and gain a certification as a technician. There is more information here: www.caninerehabinstitute.com/CCRT.html

@@EthosVeterinaryHealth thank you so much!!! When i say 4 years of undergratuate.. undergraduate of what? Would i go for a human physical therapist, and then get certified for canine physical therapist? Thank u so much!

Undergraduate programs themselves do not really matter when talking about getting into a masters program for physical therapy or medical school. As long as you have the undergraduate degree, you can continue your studies. That said, it will be very helpful to major in sciences and math. This could be a biology degree or biology and chemistry dual major. That course work will be the foundation to any further education in the medical field.

There are no longer master’s of physical therapy programs. We transitioned to doctorate level degrees a few years ago. The path to becoming a physical therapist requires an undergraduate degree typically in science based area of study i.e kinesiology, exercise physiology or biology. The candidate would then apply to graduate school for which there are typically hundreds of volunteer hours in various settings required, an interview process, letters of recommendation and competitive grades. Once accepted, most coursework is typically 3 yrs that is Heavily stacked with graduate sciences and inclusive of 4-5 clinical internships. There are also fellowships and residencies that some pursue that typically span 1-2 years post graduate school. PT’s are licensed healthcare providers and the musculoskeletal experts of the healthcare practitioners. Our PT board certified specializations include: pediatrics, neurology, geriatrics, cardiopulmonary, women’s rehab, EMG/NCV and wound care. There are many certifications that PT’s can pursue Animal Rehab being one of them. We practice in a huge array of settings. And in most states are autonomous providers of musculoskeletal services.

You would still need to take a veterinary rehab course to be certified, but it should be possible to transfer into the industry. I would recommend looking into it more and this link is a good starting point: www.caninerehabinstitute.com/CCRT.html

Ethos Veterinary Health thank you!