Standardizing CPR in veterinary medicine

Kenichiro Yagi, MS, RVT, VTS (ECC) (SAIM), chief nursing officer for Veterinary Emergency Group and program director for the RECOVER Initiative, explains the importance of CPR certification in veterinary medicine and why it is important to standardize this type of training with evidence-based guidelines, in a dvm360 interview. Yagi is leading a RECOVER workshop May 28-29, 2025, hosted by North American Veterinary Community (NAVC) during the NAVC SkillShop event in Orlando, Florida. The workshop aims to have attendees earn CPR certification and CPR instructor certification.

The following is a transcript of the video:

Kenichiro Yagi, MS, RVT, VTS (ECC) (SAIM): If you think about the human medicine field, it's actually a legal requirement for medical professionals to go through CPR training. And there are certification processes out there that [are] based off of evidence-based guidelines. Even nonmedical professionals that [work] with the public a bit, like teachers, would need to be certified in performing CPR. There's no such regulation or standard in veterinary medicine yet, and should there be? It is a really good question, but the RECOVER guidelines and the certification process is really an attempt to standardize how we perform CPR, based on an evidence-based guideline, which should improve the outcomes and spread that globally.