Our Plan
Our plan for the Clinical Veterinary Teaching & Research Complex (CVTRC) is boldly driven by eight priorities aimed at continuing our tradition of educational excellence, furthering our commitment to providing exemplary patient care, and enhancing our ability to contribute to the well-being of animals and human beings alike.
Give now and join us in enhancing educational opportunities in collaborative spaces designed to bring the brightest minds across Texas A&M University together for the betterment of animal and human medicine.
Eight Priorities for the Clinical Veterinary Teaching & Research Complex
1. Provide Exemplary Primary Care Education for Professional Students
“The teaching hospital is the pinnacle of student learning, and we have the only veterinary medical teaching hospital in the state of Texas. We do an exceptional job of teaching clinical medicine, partly because of the diverse caseload we gather here at the hospital.”
—Dr. Stacy Eckman, associate dean for hospital operations
2. Provide Traditional Referral Services for Veterinarians in the Immediate Region
“Our new facility will be an essential resource within the southern region of the United States—where treatments are available nowhere else but in College Station!”
—Dr. John August, the Carl B. King Dean of Veterinary Medicine
3. Focus on a Level of Leading-edge, Research-driven Patient Care not Available Regionally
“We have a unique opportunity to collaborate with our colleagues across the university, in those disciplines who share our interest in animal and human health, to develop the model of what a clinical veterinary teaching and research complex should be within a discovery-intensive, land-grant institution as Texas A&M University is.”
—Dr. John August, the Carl B. King Dean of Veterinary Medicine
4. Provide Advanced Care with Compassion
“We understand that pets are part of the family, and people are rightfully worried when they bring their pets here. We want to make sure that they feel welcome, that we find ways of decreasing their stress and providing reassurance while, at the same time, providing very advanced, technical patient care.”
—Dr. John August, the Carl B. King Dean of Veterinary Medicine
5. Promote Well-being for All Occupants of the Building
“The facility that we design needs to promote well-being. We have seen healing gardens in human hospitals that can help create a sense of calm and accelerate healing. I want to see that balance—that it’s not just a high-tech facility, but it’s a place where people who are immersed in this facility (be they clients, employees, or students) for long hours can feel as though the environment is welcoming and calming.”
—Dr. John August, the Carl B. King Dean of Veterinary Medicine
6. Focus on Clinical Trials, Biobanking, and Disease Surveillance
“If we look at the Clinical Veterinary Teaching & Research Complex as a research-intensive tertiary care center, we can aspire to become a teaching hospital comparable to MD Anderson. You go there to be part of a clinical trial. You go there because it is the best in the world. You go there because it is cutting-edge. People understand that that’s the role Texas A&M should have in caring for companion animals.”
—Dr. John August, the Carl B. King Dean of Veterinary Medicine
7. Focus on Telehealth and Remote Digital Monitoring
“Texas is a big state, and part of our land-grant mission is to serve the citizens of Texas. How do we connect if people can’t drive from the Rio Grande Valley or the Panhandle to us? I see solid opportunities for our telehealth program to grow and extend down to the Rio Grande Valley in helping veterinarians there who don’t have access to convenient referral and tertiary care.”
—Dr. John August, the Carl B. King Dean of Veterinary Medicine
8. Expand Outreach to Underserved Communities
“We know that some people, particularly the elderly in rural communities, have a hard time accessing veterinary care, so we visit between 20-28 clients monthly to do what we can because our role is to support the bond between people and their pets, no matter their socioeconomic status.”
—Dr. Lori Teller, clinical professor and founder of the Free Pet Wellness
Services for Seniors program in Bastrop, Texas