The School of Veterinary Medicine at Utrecht, as a part of the Faculty of Veterinary Medicine at Utrecht University, is the only place in the Netherlands where veterinarians are trained. The Faculty of Veterinary Medicine (and thus the School of Veterinary Medicine) is the centre of expertise and point of reference for veterinary issues for the entire country, and increasingly for the world abroad as well. Our activities include providing primary health and welfare care for a variety of types of animals, monitoring food safety and the prevention of zoonoses (diseases transferable from animals to humans). The Faculty of Veterinary Medicine is considered one of the leading veterinary medicine faculties in Europe and is ranked in the top ten world-wide.
Education
The School of Veterinary Medicine is not only accredited by European organisations, but by the umbrella organisations in the United States and Canada as well. This means that veterinarians who have graduated from Utrecht University can go on to work anywhere in the world.
In order to qualify for international accreditation, we must constantly monitor, evaluate and improve the quality of our study programme, both as to the content of the educational forms applied as well as that of their didactic foundations. The Faculty of Veterinary Medicine even has its own chair group for Quality Control in Veterinary Education, in which we perform academic research into the various issues pertaining to education. This level of attention to quality, combined with the high standards expected of our students, have led to no less than 87% of our new students successfully completing their course of study.
Research
The staff and students of the Faculty of Veterinary Medicine perform fundamental and strategic research in the fields of animal health, diseases and welfare, and into related aspects of public health and the environment. This research is organised into five thematic interdisciplinary research programmes. The purpose of this is to stimulate scientific innovation on the interface between disciplines and to offer talented scientists a challenging research environment. These thematic research programmes are imbedded in Utrecht University’s research focus areas. These are interfacultary, multidisciplinary fields of research in which proven, high-quality research programmes have been bundled together. In addition, the Faculty performs research with the purpose of training veterinary specialists, with the goal of maintaining our leading position in specialist veterinary fields, including those that are outside of the focus of the thematic programmes. All of the Faculty of Veterinary Medicine’s research is performed under the auspices of the Institute for Veterinary Research (IVR).
Patient care
In order to facilitate our education and research, the Faculty of Veterinary Medicine has three university clinics: the Companion Animals Clinic, the Equine Clinic and the Farm Animals Clinic. These clinics provide patient care for a variety of animal species (on referral from a veterinarian), while educating veterinary students. The Equine Clinic and the Farm Animals Clinic also have an ambulatory section that can provide treatment to patients on location.
All three clinics are being or are scheduled to be renovated in order to raise the level of infrastructure and patient care facilities to a higher level. The patient care provided by our clinics are at least comparable to that provided by human clinics in the range and quality of care provided. Together, these three clinics make up the largest animal hospital outside of the United States.