Veterinary CPD Program

What is Continuing Professional Development, CPD?

Continuing professional development or CPD is an ongoing form of training that must be completed by a range of professionals to help ensure they remain professionally competent.

CPD continues to develop and maintain your professional veterinary knowledge and skills. All aspects of training are covered by CPD, from industry veterinary conferences to individual private study of single cases.

Not only is it an important part of your professional development, but it also helps grow your personal qualities too. To ensure you remain professionally competent, CPD will support you in broadening your knowledge and skills.

Who has to do CPD and why?

It is a compulsory requirement of all practicing veterinary surgeons and vet nurses listed on the RCVS Register to complete the minimum number of CPD hours.In order to have a successful career in veterinary, it is essential to keep up to date with industry news, best practices and regulations.

Regardless of whether you work full time or part-time, as a locum or are employed, you are required to complete the minimum CPD requirements as a vet or vet nurse.CPD should be seen as continuous progression that develops your capability and competence.

What are the CPD requirements for vets & Vet Nurses?

Practicing veterinarians are required to complete a minimum of 35 hours of CPD per calendar year.

Practicing veterinary nurses are required to complete a minimum of 15 hours of CPD per calendar year.

What counts as CPD?

There are many different forms of CPD activities for you to choose from so most vets and vet nurses participate in a range of activities and don’t restrict themselves to just one type.

Different development opportunities will arise throughout the year so it’s good practice to review your CPD needs regularly and put a plan in place. As of January 2022 the RCVS will change to “outcomes focused CPD” and will be assessing a “reflective” component to CPD undertaken. A veterinary continuing professional development plan and goal with reflection on the outcome  forms an element of attaining annual CPD quota.  

The following list of activities may count towards your CPD hours, though it is not exhaustive:

• Attending organised courses, lectures or seminars
• Shadowing someone of being mentored in your own practice or in another practice
• Participating in ‘learning sets’ – informal networks of colleagues who learn together. For example, by comparing and discussing case reports
• In-house training
• Secondments to other practices
• Critical reading of veterinary journals and other relevant publications – keeping a reading diary/notes
• Research, including research in preparation for giving lectures/seminars/presentations
• Reflection accompanied by brief notes –this can include reflection on a case study, an event, lecture/seminar/presentation or from informal discussions

How to record your CPD?

The RCVS have introduced a new digital recording platform called 1CPD, for you to manage your CPD. This is an app that can be downloaded  from the various App stores allowing you to plan, record and reflect on your annual veterinary CPD undertaken.

We’re committed to your professional development

We recognise the hard work our locum vets and vet nurses do for Carlton Professional Veterinary Recruitment. To show our appreciation, we offer the following rewards in terms of CPD:

• For every week of work, you complete working through our veterinary recruitment agency, we’ll pay for 2 hours of online CPD learning.
• Our CPD is webinar based, enabling you to complete your CPD at a time convenient to you and as it is online, there’s no need to travel.
• All the Veterinary CPD learning you complete via Carlton Professional Recruitment is certified for your records.

Our referral scheme

Refer a friend and you could receive £50.00 and your colleague  gets 2 hours of free CPD training*!

We work hard to maintain our reputation as the UKs leading and most trusted veterinary recruitment agency. We know our team of locum vets and vet nurses know other like-minded veterinary locums so if you’re happy to introduce your colleague to us, we would love to hear from you.

We’re dedicated to growing our team so once your colleague completes 5 days of placement through our recruitment agency, you’ll receive £50.00 (Prepaid Debit Card) and we’ll give your colleague 2 hours of free CPD training.

Get in touch with a member of our recruitment team today.