North Okanagan Veterinary Association - NOVA

10/18/2026

HUGE thank you to Dr. Herbst for an extremely insightful lecture. She is brilliant, an incredible speaker, and deeply motivating!

The lecture explored the underlying reasons why cognitive biases arise in medicine, highlighting how our brains naturally rely on mental shortcuts to process information and make decisions efficiently. While these shortcuts are important and helpful, they can contribute to unconscious biases and errors in clinical judgment!

In addition, she provided practical tips for the referring general practice veterinarians to ensure patients are prepped in ways that helps the receiving emergency team streamline their care.

Thank you Fairfield Animal Hospital Kelowna for supporting her and NOVA with your large attendance. It is wonderful putting faces to the names of emergency veterinarians and technicians we speak to on the phone.

09/26/2026

📣 NEXT EVENT — MARK YOUR CALENDARS!
📅 October 1

🩺 Veterinarians & RVTs are welcome!

We hope everyone had a fantastic summer! ☀️ We’re excited to announce our next speaker, Dr. Ann-Louise Herbst!

Dr. Herbst is an emergency veterinarian at Fairfield Emergency Hospital with over a decade of experience. She has worked in emergency and specialty referral clinics across Canada and Australia and was recently awarded the prestigious designation of ABVP Diplomate in Canine & Feline Practice. 🐾

On October 1, Dr. Herbst will be discussing an inevitable part of veterinary medicine: medical mistakes and biases — an important topic for everyone working in the profession.

Please RSVP as soon as you can. We look forward to seeing you all! 💚

09/06/2026

‼ Next Event - Mark your calendars! October 1!

We hope everyone had a fantastic summer. We are excited to announce our next speaker, Dr. Ann-Louise Herbst!

Dr. Herbst is an emergency veterinarian at Fairfield Emergency Hospital who has over a decade of experience. She has worked in various emergency and specialty referral clinics across Canada and Australia. Most recently, she has been awarded the prestigious honour of becoming an ABVP Diplomate in Canine & Feline Practice.

On October 1, Dr. Herbst will be talking about the inevitable: medical mistakes and biases. Please RSVP as soon as you can. We look forward to seeing you all!

06/07/2026

Save the date! 📍🪱🐄🐑 & technicians welcome!

Dr. Tim Nickel, one of Boehringer Ingelheim's Technical Services Veterinarians, is flying to us on June 17 to talk about ruminant parasitology. He practiced for 16 years as a mixed veterinarian in Alberta before transitioning into this role. We are super excited to hear what he has to say about management, treatments, and resistance. See you soon!

04/17/2026

Our first event of the year was a great turn out! Thanks again to Dr. Liggett and Vetoquinol for putting together a very practical lecture on OA.

04/08/2026

Reminder for everyone! Vetoquinol’s sponsored event on OA this Thursday!

Save the date! April 9th! 🗓️❗️

Dr Jeni Liggett with Vetoquinol is presenting on Osteoarthritis in dogs at Phoenix Steakhouse! 1 hour RACE approved CE.

Send your RSVP to [email protected] before March 26th!

03/22/2026

Hey everyone!!

We are back in action ready for 2026! Looking forward to seeing everyone again and reconnecting!

03/09/2026

Save the date! April 9th! 🗓️❗️

Dr Jeni Liggett with Vetoquinol is presenting on Osteoarthritis in dogs at Phoenix Steakhouse! 1 hour RACE approved CE.

Send your RSVP to [email protected] before March 26th!

01/19/2026

‼️Attention skin enthusiasts 🐶🐱🧴

Saturday, April 11, the North West Veterinary Dermatology Services is hosting a Dermatology Forum at the Kelowna Yacht Club!

This is a free in-person continuing education event for veterinarians. Join for a day of practical dermatology education led by four board-certified specialists, covering canine otitis, optimizing the dermatologic exam, adverse food reactions, and pemphigus in dogs and cats. Enjoy a hot breakfast and lunch buffet, meaningful opportunities to connect with your colleagues, and clinically relevant insights you can take straight back to your practice!

Registration is limited to veterinarians.
CVBC CE credits: 3 hours.

We hope to see you there!

NWVDS DERMATOLOGY FORUM

12/03/2025

🎉THANK YOU!

It has been an absolute pleasure hosting these events for everyone in our inaugural year. Each time we see more connections growing between people and new faces joining! Our seasoned colleagues shared with us that there used to be a group in the Okanagan like this and they are very happy to see it reignited! Super cool!

Thank you to the veterinarians who created the time to prepare RACE approved presentations. Many pearls of wisdom shared.
- Dr. Hans Gelens (Fairfield Animal Hospital)
- Dr. Katrina Barth (Fairfield Animal Hospital)
- Dr. Conny Mosley (Veterinary Consultant, Elanco)
- Dr. Bianca Bauer (Okanagan Eye Care)
- Dr. Michael Perkel (Tri-Lake Animal Hospital & Referral Centre)
- Dr. Kinga Gortel (North West Veterinary Dermatology Services)
- Dr. Jeni Liggett (Technical Services Veterinarian, Vetoquinol)

We continue to receive interest from sponsors to host future events so please stay tuned as the 3 of us plan to get together and orchestrate 2026.

Massive thank you to our 2025 sponsor hosts:
- Boehringer Ingelheim
- Elanco
- Summit Veterinary Pharmacy LTD
- Zoetis
- Vetoquinol