The Collaborative Vet Podcast - Michael Dr.T Tokiwa

Catherine Dennig, co founder of FurSure pet insurance brokerage company discusses how their free system works.  It's free, simple, and matches you with the top choices for pet insurance, either via a phone call or a click to their website.  Her goal was to make navigating a difficult decision of deciding on the insurance easier.  Pet insurance operates on a completely different level than hum...

Catherine Dennig faced what many pet parents face, facing a decision between best medicine and finances, when she faced expensive options for her cat Simba's cancer treatments.  Driven by wanting to help people never have to make such decisions, she researched about pet insurance.  Which one is best?  How to decide?  That's how getfursure was created.  A simple, free system to help pet p...

Dr. Frieman was always fascinated about the relationship between the veterinarian, the client and the patient.  As technology advances, and because of a chance after hours call with a friend, he felt the need to embrace the change and help pet parents determine urgency to after hour pet medical incidents.  Let's face it, Dr. Google does not have a veterinary degree.  Here, Dr. Freiman gives a...

The veterinary team face a number of phone call challenges.  In this series I break down some common hurdles that the CSR team faces.  My hope is to bring to light the reality of these situations....with humor....but also to start a conversation among team management about how to deal with these scenarios.  I also hope that pet parents listening can come to understand that these are difficult situ...

Tara and Jessica were both working at J&J, sharing their desire to find something better for the health of their rescue and foster dogs.  The result, Dig Labs.  Their current project is an app that visually identifies gastrointestinal parasites from images of dog feces.  It was inspiring to talk to these two entrepreneurs.  #diglabs #entrepeneur #pethealth #originstory #petparasites #veterinar...

During this time of COVID and  Asian Hate Crimes, I was inspired to meet two young, Asian entrepreneurs.  Tara and Jessica's accomplishments prior to becoming business owners are inspiring enough, and their message to young people out there (regardless of age, race or anything else) is empowering.  #mentorship #entrepeneur #inspiration #diglabs 

Recently, several veterinarians have taken their lives.  One was a graduate from my school, The Atlantic Veterinary College.  Veterinarians face huge struggles that many other professions do not.  It is why 40% or less of practicing veterinarians actually recommend it as a profession.  The financial, emotional and physical strains are much more different than those faced by our human medical peers...

Dr. CG Byers is a a double boarded veterinary specialist in both emergency and critical care and internal medicine.  He is also the Founder and Editor in Chief of CriticalCareDVM, an educational resource for both veterinary teams and the general public.  Here we discuss the triad of care, a collaboration between the pet parent, their regular veteran and the specialist.  Communication is one of Dr....

When COVID hit, many of us in the veterinary profession didn't know what to do.  We cut back our hours, became curbside and waited.  We looked inward and saw how we could improve our business.  In the end we made a few different choices.  We increased our team numbers, and improved how we communicate with clients.  While other hospitals reopened to regular hourse, and some even cut back on te...

With today’s advancements in quality of healthcare for your pets, it is important and necessary to have the involvement of veterinary specialists.  Collaborating with specialists enables your veterinarian to bring higher quality care and increased longevity for your pet.   Unfortunately access to specialty centers can be limited.  How can we as veterinarians get specialty input on our cases?  Kris...

I lost Holly almost a year ago to this date, and Neil more recently, both succumbing to cancer.  I think of both of them often and how each in their own way provided me with guidance on Life.   

We celebrate people doing good in this world.  Rene Agredano and Jim Nelson didn't know what to expect when their dog Jerry was diagnosed with cancer and faced leg amputation.  12 years ago, very little resources existed to help them through this.  It was a life changing experience for them.  Travel forward in time to today, they host the largest community of Pet Parents of 3 legged animals i...

COVID19 has completely changed our lives, but it doesn't have to stop your veterinarian providing healthcare to your pets.  We are managing by providing what we call "curbside care", and virtual visits.  In this episode, I talk about the process of curbside care and how we can still give you our best medical approaches toward pet healthcare.   

By now, I'm sure everyone has heard about the tiger that tested positive for COVID19 at the Bronx zoo.  This episode discusses (at the current time) how relevant that positive result is to you and your pets.  As always, this is a continually changing situation.  Stay healthy.  Stay Safe!

Even before COVID19, my practice faced some pretty difficult challenges.  It's through those challenges that key, dedicated team members shine.  This episode is dedicated to one such team member.  Thank you Emily!!

Everything is changing, but veterinary hospitals are considered (for the time being) essential.  As a result, we are still open, but taking a "curbside" approach to pet care.  In this episode I talk what it involves, and what options, including telehealth that we have.  In the meantime, please be kind and enjoy your social distancing.  

By chance I decided to test myself for Lyme Disease.  At the last veterinary conference while getting a Rabies titer, I decided to get tested for Lyme (assuming it would be negative).  Results returned 2 weeks later and indicated that I had Lyme disease!  I've lived in NJ for 20 years,  have never had an engorged tick on me, well at least not knowingly.  I am "tick Paranoid" ie. I d...

I met The NAVC Retriever creator, Dr. Aubrey Kumm as I walked along the main hallway at VMX2020. It was one of those spontaneous interviews that turned out great! Aubrey created this app because he wanted to make it easier for employers, veterinarians, and vet team members to find jobs. Here he discusses the app, his previous app that helped diagnose children on the Autism spectrum, and his view a...