Bourgelat Award winner to speak at BSAVA Congress
Dr Jeffery received this year’s Bourgelat Award in recognition of his contributions to small animal veterinary medicine.
Nick Jeffery, the winner of the British Small Animal Veterinary Association (BSAVA) Bourgelat Award 2024, has been announced as a speaker at the association’s forthcoming congress.
He will present a lecture titled ‘Veterinary medicine is a playground of uncertainty’, exploring how veterinary teams can respond to uncertainty about diseases and treatments.
Dr Jeffery, who specialises in neurology and neurosurgery, received this year’s Bourgelat Award in recognition of his international contributions to small animal veterinary medicine.
A graduate from the University of Bristol, Dr Jeffery has worked in primary care practice, private surgical/neurosurgical referrals, science laboratories and veterinary schools in the UK and the USA. He has also undergone specialist training in clinical trial design and analysis.
Following his graduation his career started in a charity clinic, where he treated many animals suffering from major trauma. Realising he did not remember enough from veterinary school on the matter, Dr Jeffery sought neurology textbooks to expand his knowledge.
He went on to work in a referral clinic with Tom Yarrow, treating dogs with spinal cord injuries. This sparked further interest in neurology, prompting him to study for his PhD in neuroscience with Prof Bill Blakemore at Cambridge.
It was studying at Cambridge which inspired Dr Jeffery to consider the possibilities for treatment of severe central nervous system diseases.
Dr Jeffery will draw on his experiences with neurology in his lecture, though the content will be applicable to other disciplines. It will outline some of the gaps in veterinary knowledge, and consider approaches to overcome these problems.
He said: “I chose the title because the lecture will contain the type of material that will not be generally available at BSAVA congress but might be of general interest. The theme will be that there are a lot of things we don’t really know as vets about the diseases we treat and the effects of the treatments we give, but this isn’t something to be afraid of.
“Instead, it’s one of the things that makes medicine endlessly fascinating, because there is always more to learn.”
The lecture will be presented at BSAVA Congress 2024 on 23 March. It will take place during the neurology module from 12.20pm – 12.50pm in Charter 1.
Image © BSAVA
Veterinary practices are being urged to help owners safely dispose of any unused and expired pet medicines - not just antibiotics - during November's Animal Medicines Amnesty. 
