Discovering purpose in veterinary medicine

Passion and purpose help fuel careers in veterinary medicine but what drives individuals to continually provide animal health care isn’t always easy to identify. For Kenichiro Yagi, MS, RVT, VTS (ECC) (SAIM), chief veterinary nursing officer for Veterinary Emergency Group (VEG), discovering what his passion and purpose are all about came with career starts and pauses, and challenging life experiences. He shared his personal story by delivering the Day 1 keynote in a full ballroom at the 2025 Fetch dvm360 Conference in Kansas City, Missouri.

Photos: Kristen Coppock Crossley, MA/dvm360

Kenichiro Yagi, MS, RVT, VTS, delivers the keynote presentation on the first day of the 2025 Fetch dvm360 Conference in Kansas City, Missouri.

Earlier in his career, Yagi said, he was attending a veterinary conference and discussing with a friend how veterinary technicians or nurses could be better utilized. The man stopped the conversation to ask Yagi, “what are you about?” Although the question bothered him at first, Yagi told the audience that it also made him think to find meaning in it.

Yagi proceeded to tell Fetch attendees about some of the challenges, detours, accomplishments and drive that his career has brought him. He talked about his initial intention to become a veterinarian, only to drop out of veterinary school when he realized it wasn’t what he wanted. After taking time off and occupying himself with video games, Yagi opted to pursue a different path in veterinary medicine by working as a technician at Adobe Animal Hospital in Los Altos, California.

It was at Adobe Animal Hospital that Yagi started building skills in orthopedic surgery, while receiving mentorship from practice leaders, who encouraged technician certification. When he was asked by a mentor is he liked his job, he realized he wanted to remain in veterinary medicine. “I really got to learn about myself [while working at Adobe Animal Hospital]. And I also grew up, from being a kid that just dropped out of vet school to be more of an adult,” Yagi said.

Initially, Yagi said he became “sidetracked” by other pursuits, including a second job as a manga (Japanese comics) translator. It would be many years before he achieved certifications.

Yagi shared a painting of his daughter with Fetch attendees.

It was Yagi’s newborn daughter, who was born with left-sided lung agenesis, that provided the biggest impact on his career. “She was having trouble breathing and so we spent the next couple of months in the neonatal [intensive care unit],” Yagi told attendees.

Yagi and his wife, Iris, visited their daughter daily, while taking time off from work to be with her, he explained. During that time, the baby grew stronger and was eventually able to go home with her parents. However, she later went into respiratory distress and was brought back to the pediatric ICU and was placed on a ventilator.

“We did our everyday visits again, and over the course of time, she didn’t get stronger. She got worse,…Basically, her body kept growing but her trachea size did not change. There needed to be some way to open up her airway better,” Yagi said. “We did everything we could for her…and talked a lot about different kinds of experimental surgeries.”

Then, Yagi’s infant daughter died. “After that, I stopped working altogether [for about 6 months], just stayed at home,” Yagi said.

While they were grieving, Yagi and his wife had a conversation that became a defining moment in that he realized life needed to move forward. This moment provided motivation and a purpose. “When I think about my time with our daughter, one thing stands out and it’s the nurses,” Yagi said.

He spoke next about the medical care nurses provided to his daughter as well as the emotional care they provided Yagi and his wife. Essentially, these nurses went above and beyond with compassion to care for the whole family.

Yagi realized that veterinary technicians could emulate that type of nursing care not only for patients but also for clients and families. For pet owners, “it’s their one family member that we’re taking care of. How can we change veterinary medicine so that the experience could be better,” he said. “So that's where I started to think about, how can I be a better nurse? How can I do more for [clients]?”

Yagi has since earned a master’s degree in veterinary sciences and professional technician credentials that include specialist designations for emergency and critical care, and small animal internal medicine. After advancing to blood bank manager and then ICU manager for Adobe Animal Hospital, he became the veterinary education simulation laboratory manager at Cornell University in Ithaca, New York.

Yagi is now an independent veterinary technician education, in addition to his position with VEG. He is simultaneously serving as program director for the RECOVER initiative, which provides veterinary certification courses for CPR and CPR instructors, and is an advocate for standardizing CPR in veterinary medicine. Yagi has also authored and edited multiple books on topics that include transfusion medicine and blood banking, among other industry-leading accomplishments.

Reference

Yagi K. From passion to purpose: discovering what truly drives me. Presented at: Fetch dvm360 Conference; Kansas City, Missouri. August 22-24, 2025.