In staff news, congratulations to vet Matt who is now a proud dad to a gorgeous baby daughter. Matt is now to be seen spending his spare time looking at baby paraphernalia and discussing the varying sleep regression stages.

We are also delighted to welcome a familiar face to our vet team – Stephanie has seen practice with us over the years and is very familiar with all things Dacre House. Having now graduated from Nottingham University she is excited to start her career with us. Stephanie’s particular interests are small animal medicine and veterinary public health. In her spare time, she helps with the audiovisual team at a local church, and is involved with the Veterinary Christian Fellowship. She also enjoys watching films, swimming & eating ice cream!

Furthering the expertise of our veterinary surgeon team, Gabriella has now started a Postgraduate certificate in feline practice. We are looking forward to Gabriella’s insights and expertise in all things cat-related as her studies progress.

On the staff news front, nurse Lydia put us all to shame by running a half marathon at Battersea Park recently, making a respectable finish within 2 hours 53 minutes – well done Lydia! We may be putting your gained skills to use on the endless road closure days as a runner between Southborough and Pembury…

We are also pleased to welcome a not-so-new face, Alice, to the nursing team. Alice has been training with us and we are delighted to have her officially employed as part of the Dacre House team. Alice comes to us with lots of expertise and a wonderfully calm demeanour. She loves all aspects of veterinary nursing, though says her favourite shift is always ‘kennels’. Alice is owner of elderly (yet sprightly!) jack russell, Bella, but is also a huge cat enthusiast at work.

It is our ethos to continually support training and development. Ellie and Abi have now enrolled with the College for Animal Welfare and are undertaking their Diploma course for Veterinary Care Assistants. We look forward to supporting and encouraging them in their studies alongside their work.

Ellie joined us in August having completed two years' of animal management training at Hadlow College. She is confident with all small animal species having her own menagerie at home: 3 dogs, 1 cat, 8 rabbits and a coup of chickens!
Izabel has changed career from primary teaching assistant to working with animals, inspired by her earlier experience of being a meercat keeper at the Hop Farm. Having studied Pyschology and Sociology she is particularly interested in the people side of the veterinary and the care of animals especially after surgery.
Abi has just joined us from the Big Cat Sanctuary. A lover of cats (and big dogs!), she is looking forward to learning more about veterinary nursing. At home she has a cat and a chameleon.

Also, you may have spotted we are doing a bit of building work over in Pembury. We are pleased to say that work has finally started on the first phase of our building project which will eventually mean that we will be able to carry out a range of surgical procedures in Pembury as well as in Southborough. We’ll keep you updated as work progresses.

In other exciting family news – vet Hannah is now mum to a gorgeous baby boy; both are doing well. Also, at the end of the summer we were all very excited to attend the long awaited wedding of receptionist Paige to her fiance, George. Wishing them both lots of love and happiness for the future.

Lydia had another successful summer, showing her heifers at the Edenbridge and Oxted show. She was awarded the prestigious award of ‘champion young handler’ as well as gaining 1st, 4th and 5th prizes for her breeds.

You may have noticed a little change of colour scheme to brighten up the waiting area at Southborough. We are still working on our re-decoration programme; never an easy feat given our long opening hours and busy lives but we’re gradually getting there!