Rising high in veterinary medicine

Growing up in Guyana, South America, surrounded by domestic pets and agricultural animals, Dion Small, BSc, LVT, dreamed of becoming an airline pilot. He instead began a career path that would eventually lead him to his current position as a practicing veterinary technician and LVT/assistant director for internal medicine, cardiology, primary care service, medical-surgical unit and the clinic at Schwarzman Animal Medical Center in New York, New York.

Small currently has 2 terriers, Naomi and Mandy. Growing up, his grandmother had cats, while his mother had dogs and a parrot. “My first introduction to that parrot was when it bit me, and they bite really, really hard,” he said. “I’ve had quite a few pets throughout the years.”

Small said he realized early on that his dream of flying airplanes was not the career meant for him. Upon graduating from high school, he entered a program to train animal health assistants created for the Caribbean Community and Common Market (CARICOM) countries. “The school was located in Guyana….We had students from all the Caribbean countries studying,” Small said in a dvm360 interview.

After completing the program, Small went to work as an animal health assistant with a sugar business in Guyana that incorporated dairy farming and sheep rearing. For about a decade, Small built his animal health care skills working in a similar capacity to that of a US veterinary technician, he said.

“We ran the hospital on the farms. We delivered the calves when they were having difficult births. One of the things I was able to do was artificial insemination. So I did artificial inseminations on quite a number of cows,” he added.

Small said he learned early on that humans should never turn their back on a bull. “In my career, I did that and almost paid the price,” he said.

He recalled walking away from a bull in a barn when a colleague in the adjacent milking parlor jumped up and told him to run. “So I ran and jumped on the fence, and this bull just smacked right into the fence,” Small said.

After spending his first 27 years of life in Guyana, Small immigrated to the US, where he landed a job handling paperwork for a company that dealt with stocks and bonds in New York, New York. “I worked for 3 months with a temp agency, which I hated,” Small said.

The turning point back to animal care happened during a walk with a woman who was helping him with a job search through the church he had joined. “We were talking about several things, and then we started talking about animals,” Small said. “In the middle of the conversation, she just stops and she goes, ‘Why don’t you do what you love?’ And I’m like, ‘What do you mean?’ And she said, ‘As I started talking about animals with you, your face just lit up.’ And so at that moment, [it was decided that] the path I should go is working with animals,” Small said.

Focusing the job search on veterinary practices, Small landed a position at Clinton Veterinary Center in the Hell’s Kitchen neighborhood of Manhattan. There, he worked with Jeffrey Fisch, DVM, as he transitioned from caring for dairy cows and other agricultural animals to caring for companion animals. “Working with cats and dogs, it’s a finer skill in terms of restraint. My first time working with a feral cat that was not the happiest camper was scary. But working with an animal, you kind of adjust. It took some adjusting, but it happened,” he said.

During his time at Clinton Veterinary Center, Small also earned a bachelor’s degree in veterinary technology at Mercy College (now Mercy University) in Dobbs Ferry, New York. “In tech school, we have to do externships. It’s part of the program, and I did my externship at the [Schwarzman] Animal Medical Center. About 6 weeks in, I was offered a job, so I’ve been with [Schwarzman] since then,” Small said.

Small worked his way up to his current position, leading a team of veterinary technicians and assistants. Although the role is not without its challenges, Small said his team is a big part of what keeps him motivated.

“One day, I came to work and there was this note on my door [from an employee], and all it said was, ‘Everybody just comes to you to complain about stuff, but I just wanted to thank you. You did a phenomenal job.’ That meant the world to me,” he said.

Small enjoys seeing his team members succeed and find their way along their career paths. He mentored one staff member who recently earned their technician license. He has also routinely worked with high school students and was proud to write a recommendation that helped a young woman gain admission to a graduate program.

“Those are the things I like. It makes me really happy. I love it when I see people grow and develop,” he said.