Linnaeus Celebrates Hitting 100th ISFM Cat-friendly Clinic Milestone

Across the group, 16 practices have earned gold status, the highest accolade given by the ISFM, with a further 75 at silver and nine at bronze. 

Pets’n’Vets in Glasgow and Abbey House Veterinary Hospital in Leeds are the latest Linnaeus veterinary centres to achieve the ultimate gold accreditation, while the prestigious century milestone was reached with simultaneous silver awards to MyVet, in Ireland, and the St Clair Veterinary Group, in Fife, Scotland. 

Séverine Tasker, chief medical officer at Linnaeus, welcomed the achievement, saying: “We are very proud to have reached this landmark recognition from the ISFM for our ongoing commitment to feline care across the group. 

“It is a significant achievement which illustrates our associates’ passion and determination to deliver the very best of care to our feline patients. 

“This is an ongoing commitment by Linnaeus so, whilst we acknowledge our accomplishments to date, we remain firmly focused on continuing to offer the highest levels of care to our feline patients and increasing the number of practices which reach these ISFM standards. We strive to continually improve the quality of our services to both cats and our clients.” 

Aarti Hogan, from the Linnaeus quality team who leads on cat-friendly clinics and is a cat advocate herself, said: “To achieve cat-friendly clinic status, each practice has to show it has the facilities, knowledge and training in place to reduce stress in cats, both as in-patients and out-patients. 

“The ISFM has strict criteria for any clinics hoping to achieve cat-friendly clinic status which includes having separate dog and cat waiting areas, feline-friendly hospitalisation accommodation and equipment specifically for treating cats. 

“Most importantly, staff are encouraged to approach and handle cats sensitively and respectfully and we have dedicated cat advocates at each of our accredited practices who help to lead and steer these standards. 

“Clinics are also expected to maintain high standards of veterinary care, including continuing to update their knowledge of feline medicine as new knowledge becomes available. Our associates have access to feline-specific training from both within Linnaeus and through ISFM courses.” 

Cat Friendly Clinic is a worldwide programme run by the ISFM, which recognises that, due to their unique nature and needs, taking cats to visit a vet can be very stressful, both for the animals and their owners.

The programme is designed to help address these issues by creating more cat friendly veterinary clinics and so reducing the stress for cats and making veterinary visits easier for cat owners as well. 

For more information on Linnaeus, visit www.linnaeusgroup.co.uk or search for Linnaeus on social media.