The heart of hospice: How veterinary technicians make end-of-life care work

This year’s National Veterinary Technician Week theme, “Credentialed Veterinary Technicians: Endless Compassion, Expert Care; Celebrating the Soul of Veterinary Medicine,” could serve as a job description for the technicians who work in veterinary hospice and palliative care.¹ In few areas of practice are compassion and clinical skill so tightly linked, and in few areas does a program’s success depend so heavily on the technician team.

Hospice and palliative care is not a single appointment. It is a relationship that may last days, weeks, or months, spanning diagnosis of a life-limiting disease, symptom management, ongoing quality-of-life assessment, a peaceful death, and bereavement. The 2016 The American Animal Hospital Association (AAHA) /International Association for Animal Hospital and Palliative Care (IAAHPC) End-of-Life Care Guidelines describe end-of-life care as a team effort centered on the patient’s comfort and the family’s needs.² In practice, technicians are often the team members who hold that relationship together between visits with the veterinarian.

What follows reflects the author’s experience directing a hospice and palliative care program in which credentialed technicians are involved at every stage of care. Specific tasks will vary with each state’s veterinary practice act and the level of supervision it requires.

Before the first visit

A hospice consultation is only as good as the preparation behind it. Technicians request and review records from the patient’s family and/or specialty veterinarians, organizing diagnoses, recent laboratory results, imaging findings, and current medications into a concise summary for the attending veterinarian. They also speak with families before the appointment to learn about the pet’s daily routine, the family’s concerns, and what the family hopes to gain from hospice care.

That pre-visit conversation does more than gather history. Families often arrive at hospice care exhausted and grieving. A technician who has already listened to their story sets a tone of trust before the veterinarian walks through the door, and the consultation itself can focus on decision-making rather than data collection. This also allows the family to share their most pressing concerns and allows the veterinary team to begin to triage the conditions most impacting the patient’s quality of life.

Quality-of-life consultations

In the author’s practice, technicians conduct quality-of-life consultations both in person and virtually, under veterinary direction. These conversations use structured tools, such as the Ohio State University QOL scale and our own Pathway to Care assessment tool, to help families evaluate their pet’s condition in consistent terms.^3-5 Validated pain instruments, such as the Helsinki Chronic Pain Index for dogs or the Feline Musculoskeletal Pain Index (short form) for cats, add objectivity to what can otherwise feel like guesswork for families.^6,7

Telehealth consultations are especially valuable in hospice care. Patients with advanced disease may not travel well, and families benefit from being able to check in from home. The 2023 AAHA Technician Utilization Guidelines identify telehealth as one of the area’s best suited for expanding technician roles.⁸ These consultations also relieve some of the fear around being pressured into a euthanasia decision during the appointment and can provide a very reassuring second, or even third, opinion when caregivers don’t feel confident in how they should proceed.

Building and communicating the care plan

After the veterinarian examines the patient and sets the medical direction, technicians help edit, organize, and send the SOAP record and the full palliative care plan to both the family and their veterinary teams. A clearly written plan outlines medications and dosing schedules, comfort and environmental modifications, signs of pain or distress to watch for, and what to do if an acute pain flare or crisis occurs.

Sending the plan to the rDVM keeps the primary care team informed and reinforces that hospice care complements, rather than replaces, the pet’s established veterinary relationship. Technicians frequently become the main contact for these updates, which strengthens referral relationships over time.

Staying close as disease progresses

Hospice patients change, sometimes quickly. Technicians make proactive check-in calls in the first days after a care plan starts, when families are most likely to have questions about new medications or feel unsure whether what they are seeing is normal. These calls often catch problems early, such as a pet refusing oral medication, a new side effect, or a caregiver who is overwhelmed, before they become emergencies.

Technicians also carry out many of the follow-up treatments that keep patients comfortable: administering injectable medications, giving subcutaneous fluids and teaching families to do so at home, obtaining pain scores, and reassessing mobility, appetite, and hydration. Each visit or call is a new data point. When a patient’s status changes, the technician communicates findings to the veterinarian, and the care plan is adjusted accordingly.

Ongoing quality-of-life monitoring is where this continuity matters most. A technician who has seen a patient repeatedly can recognize gradual decline that a family living with the pet every day may not notice. Walking families through serial quality-of-life scores helps them see the trend, not just the day, and prepares them for the decisions ahead.

Preparing for a peaceful goodbye

The AAHA/IAAHPC guidelines emphasize advance planning for euthanasia so that families can make decisions calmly rather than in crisis.² Technicians lead much of this pre-planning, including discussing timing and location, who will be present, preferences for aftercare and memorialization, and any rituals that matter to the family.

Technicians also coordinate pre-visit pharmaceuticals when the veterinarian prescribes them to reduce anxiety, pain, or nausea before a euthanasia appointment. They ensure that the medications are dispensed in time, that families understand when and how to give them, and that the plan fits the individual patient. A calm, well-prepared patient and family make for a more peaceful experience for everyone, including the veterinary team.

Care that continues after loss

A hospice program’s responsibility does not end when the patient dies. Technicians write personal sympathy cards, often drawing on details they learned while caring for the pet, and they provide grief support through follow-up calls and referrals to pet-loss resources. The end-of-life care guidelines recognize bereavement support as part of comprehensive end-of-life care.² For many families, a handwritten note from the technicians who helped care for their pet is one of the most lasting memories of the entire experience.

Why it matters for technicians and for practices

Using technicians to the full extent of their training is not only good for patients; it is also essential for the profession. In a 2021 survey of about 2,000 veterinary technicians, 57% reported that they were sometimes or frequently not asked to perform medical tasks they were qualified to do, and technicians who planned to leave their jobs were more likely to report being underutilized^.9 AAHA utilization guidelines identify underutilization as a leading reason credentialed technicians leave the profession and report that practices maximizing technician delegation see an average revenue increase of 36%.^8-10

Hospice and palliative care offers a clear model of what full utilization looks like. It draws on a technician’s communication skills, clinical judgment, expertise, and emotional intelligence all at once. It also allows the veterinarian to focus on diagnosis, prognosis, prescribing, and the clinical decision-making and procedures only a veterinarian can perform.

This work does carry an emotional cost. Technicians in hospice care form close bonds with patients and families and experience loss repeatedly. Programs that rely on technicians should also invest in them through regular debriefs, mentorship, manageable caseloads, and open conversations about compassion fatigue and well-being.

Celebrating the soul of veterinary medicine

Families rarely remember the dose of a medication or the details of a SOAP note. They remember the person who called to check on them the day after a new plan started, who taught them how to give fluids, who helped them see that it was time, and who sent a card afterward. In a hospice program, that person is very often an amazing veterinary technician.

This National Veterinary Technician Week, practices offering, or considering, hospice and palliative care services should look at where their technicians already contribute and where they could do more.

References

1. National Association of Veterinary Technicians in America. National Veterinary Technician Week. Accessed September 22, 2026. https://navta.net/national-veterinary-technician-week/
2. Bishop G, Cooney K, Cox S, et al. 2016 AAHA/IAAHPC end-of-life care guidelines. J Am Anim Hosp Assoc. 2016;52(6):341-356. doi:10.5326/JAAHA-MS-6637
3. Villalobos AE. Quality-of-life assessment techniques for veterinarians. Vet Clin North Am Small Anim Pract. 2011;41(3):519-529. doi:10.1016/j.cvsm.2011.03.013
4. Honoring the Bond, The Ohio State University Veterinary Medical Center. Quality of life scale. In: How Will I Know? Assessing Quality of Life and Making Difficult Decisions for Your Pet. Rev. March 2024:6. Accessed September 24, 2026. https://vmc.vet.osu.edu/sites/default/files/documents/how-will-i-know_rev_mar2024ms_0.pdf
5. Caring Pathways. Pathway to Care Assessment for dogs & cats. Updated April 22, 2026. Accessed September 24, 2026. https://caringpathways.com/pathway-to-care-assessment/
6. Hielm-Björkman AK, Rita H, Tulamo RM. Psychometric testing of the Helsinki chronic pain index by completion of a questionnaire in Finnish by owners of dogs with chronic signs of pain caused by osteoarthritis. Am J Vet Res. 2009;70(6):727-734. doi:10.2460/ajvr.70.6.727
7. Enomoto M, Lascelles BDX, Robertson JB, Gruen ME. Refinement of the Feline Musculoskeletal Pain Index (FMPI) and development of the short-form FMPI. J Feline Med Surg. 2022;24(2):142-151. doi:10.1177/1098612X211011984
8. Boursiquot N, Prendergast H, Boudreau L, et al. 2023 AAHA Technician Utilization Guidelines. American Animal Hospital Association; 2023. Accessed September 22, 2026. https://www.aaha.org/resources/2023-aaha-technician-utilization-guidelines/
9. Larkin M. Survey finds underuse related to retention for veterinary technicians. JAVMA News. December 8, 2021. Accessed September 22, 2026. https://www.avma.org/javma-news/2021-12-15/survey-finds-underuse-related-retention-veterinary-technicians
10. Lederhouse C. AAHA releases veterinary technician utilization guidelines. AVMA News. November 13, 2023. Accessed September 22, 2026. https://www.avma.org/news/aaha-releases-veterinary-technician-utilization-guidelines