April   2003   VOLUME 56: Number 4 Veterinary Ireland Journal Page CONTENTS Peer review articles are available in full as  Acrobat PDF files You will need to download the Acrobat reader    which can be got free at this web site

EDITORIAL   

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The pivotal role of the Veterinary Laboratory Service

In this issue the editorial Focus has endeavoured to highlight the importance of research in underpinning the professional contribution of the veterinarian to animal health and to the welfare of society in general. Specifically, it has sought to depict the breadth of the activities of the nation's Veterinary Laboratory Service (VLS), with particular reference to the central role of the Research Laboratory at Abbotstown. It is entirely appropriate that our readers should be briefed on the work being done by the staff of that institution and on the services that it is able to provide in the event of novel or atypical challenges to the professional skills of those amongst us who work ‘in the field’. Contritely, we have to confess that this is an exercise we should have undertaken long since. However, it is not inappropriate to do so now, in the context of the imminent transfer of the laboratory from the Georgian grandeur of Abbotstown to purpose-built, state-of-the-art facilities on a green-field site at Backweston, Co Kildare.

The Department of Agriculture and Food is entitled to enormous credit for this investment in the future of veterinary research. The up-to-date laboratory and farm facilities will greatly strengthen the capacity of the staff to meet the changing demands of the society they serve (which, in some contexts, includes the entire European Union) and, in the process, provide them with the opportunity to boost their standing in the ranks of the extended scientific community. It is our fervent hope that the Department will take a similarly enlightened attitude to the recruitment and training of young veterinarians and to the provision of an attractive career structure that will retain the brightest and most productive of the recruits.

At a recent seminar, hosted by the Royal College of Veterinary Surgeons in London, there was general agreement that there is a shortage of veterinarians in research, largely because those who have the necessary aptitude, ambition and commitment to succeed in that field do not find a satisfactory career structure within the state-run laboratory service. In the event, the slack is being taken up by graduates who do not have veterinary qualifications. Furthermore, current trends in the concepts and techniques of biological sciences presage a much greater involvement of non-veterinary graduates in areas of research that, traditionally, have been the bailiwick of veterinarians. In an era dominated by the arcane rites of molecular biology, immunoassays, genomics, and microarray experiments, it is inevitable that the VLS will be under some pressure to follow suit; its response should be consonant with its core responsibilities as a diagnostic and reference laboratory.

Despite some strongly-held caveats, it has to be acknowledged that the quality of research in the laboratory should stand to benefit considerably from the technical expertise and biological insights of young, well-trained science graduates. It is inconceivable that the benefits would not spill over into the diagnostic service. However, a strong veterinary presence is imperative if the laboratory is to properly discharge its statutory responsibilities with regard to exotic diseases, zoonoses, and those other diseases for which it has been designated the National Reference Laboratory. Informed veterinary input is required also to properly interpret the clinical relevance and the potential application of data emerging from the latest piece of basic research.

As a generalisation to which there may be the occasional exception, one should not expect the laboratory-based science graduate to be able to sense, unerringly, the application of "basic" results to the field conditions that appertain to farm animals or companion animals. By contrast, the veterinary graduate has an appreciation of the pathogenesis of particular syndromes in those species and is familiar with the many variables (including the husbandry systems, nutritional requirements, and welfare issues) that can influence the way the animal responds, the way the disease progresses, and the ways in which the disease can be brought under control. These are special skills that come with experience, take time to acquire, and need to be exercised at critical points in the course of laboratory investigations.

Thus, experience acquired during formative years in veterinary practice provides an invaluable backdrop to a career in research on animal diseases. However, it must not be assumed that this experience alone is an adequate preparation for a successful transition to work in a laboratory: experienced practitioners who desire to make that step need formal training in the discipline of choice. It may be argued that in-house experience will suffice; the evidence is that the phenomenal progress toward ever more sophisticated molecular knowledge has made that contention even more problematic than it always has been. The massive capital investment in physical resources should be linked with a policy decision to match the superb facilities with staff who have been given the opportunity to acquire the skills required to put those facilities to the best possible use n

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