The Veterinary Care Accessibility Project
Our Mission
Our mission is to improve animal and human welfare by developing data driven tools to guide decision makers in improving to access to veterinary care
VCAP
Throughout the country, millions of people and their pets do not have adequate access to veterinary care. The challenge is complex, touching issues of income inequality, transportation access, language differences, and the veterinary industry itself, just to name a few. The Veterinary Care Accessibility Project (VCAP) is an effort to better understand and inform the complexities that underlie the access to veterinary care challenge, and to build tools to help drive real action toward improving access for people and their pets.
What we do
Our current focus is the development and publication of the Veterinary Care Accessibility Score. We are currently working on the second version of the VCAS, which will incorporate pricing data to shed more light on the challenge of the cost of veterinary care. We are also working on additional indices that will better quantify the efficacy of veterinary care as it relates to animal and human welfare improvement.
Who We Are
We are a small team at this point. We have extensive experience in the world of access to care from multiple angles: clinical practice, public policy, strategy, and research.
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Michael Greenberg, DVMMike Greenberg is a veterinarian. He works at the intersection of clinical practice, technology, and research. He splits his professional time between designing software for veterinary clinics and animal shelters, and working clinically in high-volume-high-quality spay-neuter and wellness. He has authored and co-authored several articles and books, including Every Nose Counts: Using Metrics in Animal Shelters.
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Sue Neal, PhDDr. Sue M. Neal has over 25 years of experience in animal welfare. She started her career as the Wildlife and Exotic Animals Specialist for the largest humane society in Michigan. This role inspired her interest in public policy and she went on to complete a doctorate in public administration, an MPA and an MS in Geography/GIS. Sue has a strong interest in the intersection of public policy, data analytics and GIS, in particular as it relates to access to veterinary care and improving welfare for animals. She now works as a research and data analytics consultant in the field of animal welfare, is a professor of political science at Arkansas State University, and is the executive director of a nonprofit nature preserve. Her scholarly interests are broad and she has published in a number of journals including the top ranked Public Administration Review, the Journal of Public Integrity, Review of Public Personnel Administration and Frontiers in Veterinary Science. She has also contributed several book chapters on topics ranging from private property rights, the future of constitutional ethics and the use of GIS as a democratizing force in small town governance. Sue resides in Michigan surrounded by feline friends where she leads a car-free, vegan lifestyle.
We want to expand our team. Access to veterinary care is a complex issue and tackling it will clearly require many perspectives and skill sets. If you or your organization would like to partner with us, please get in touch.