Her Story
About Kristin
Dr. Kristin Welch, DVM, DACVECC, is a board-certified veterinary emergency and critical care specialist with over 20 years of experience in veterinary medicine. She completed her Doctor of Veterinary Medicine training at Michigan State University, followed by a rotating internship at the University of Pennsylvania and residency training in Emergency and Critical Care at Tufts University. What has consistently drawn her to the field is a deep commitment to both people and animals, recognizing that veterinary medicine is at least 75% communication and partnership with pet owners. She brings a strong focus on collaborative care, combining clinical expertise with a patient-centered and client-focused approach. She is the Founder and Chief Medical Officer of DVM STAT Consulting, an international veterinary teleconsultation service she launched as a pilot in 2019 and expanded globally in 2024. The company was created to bridge a critical gap in veterinary care: far more veterinarians exist than veterinary specialists, leaving many clinicians without timely access to advanced guidance. Today, DVM STAT Consulting provides 24/7 support to veterinarians anywhere in the world, offering access to a team of more than 45 board-certified specialists across disciplines including internal medicine, cardiology, neurology, oncology, emergency and critical care, radiology, and more. The service is designed to support rural practices, resource-limited settings, and clients who may be unable to pursue traditional specialty referral, ensuring that high-quality veterinary care remains accessible regardless of location or financial constraints. Prior to founding DVM STAT Consulting, Dr. Welch spent 10 years as Director of the emergency department at a startup veterinary hospital, where she helped grow the organization into a 22-doctor team and establish it as the first VECCS Level 1 facility in the Southeast. She went on to co-found a second specialty hospital, and for the past two decades has taught veterinary students and practicing veterinarians alongside her clinical work. Building high-performing, collaborative emergency and critical care teams across these settings reinforced her understanding of both the strengths and limitations of localized specialty care. It also inspired her to expand her impact beyond a single region, ultimately leading to the creation of a scalable, international model that brings specialty expertise directly to veterinarians wherever they practice.
Her Interview
Ten minutes with Kristin
01What do you attribute your success to?
I attribute my success to my love of learning and teaching. That's carried through everything I've built, and it's the foundation of DVM STAT's mission: to educate and empower veterinarians to practice at their highest level, backed by the support of board-certified specialists. An open mind and a willingness to keep growing have let me learn from some of the brightest minds in veterinary medicine, and teaching has given me a way to pass that forward.
02What’s the best career advice you’ve ever received?
The best career advice I've ever received is to focus on compassionate communication. More than 75 percent of my job is working with the families who love these pets, and while veterinary medicine is my primary responsibility, I haven't done my job well if the owner doesn't understand why we're making a given recommendation and what it will cost, even when the patient has an excellent outcome.
As an emergency specialist, I work with the sickest of the sick, and I never lose sight of the fact that there is no good time for a pet to become critically ill. These situations are sudden, frightening, and take an enormous emotional toll on the family. Recognizing that is a core part of the job, not separate from it. I counsel families on the best next step for their situation and make sure the outcome I'm working toward is quality of life for the pet, not just survival.
03What advice would you give to young women entering your industry?
Find mentors who will push you to dig deeper, not just make you feel confident. The senior clinicians who challenge your thought process early in your career are the ones shaping the clinician you'll become.
Get comfortable saying "I don't know, let me find out." In emergency and specialty medicine especially, the vets who become the best, most well-rounded clinicians are the ones who normalize looking things up, collaborating with a colleague, or asking for a second opinion rather than guessing. It's impossible to know everything, but knowing where to find the answer is what matters.
Protect your boundaries before burnout forces you to. Veterinary medicine has one of the highest burnout and attrition rates of any field in medicine. Build your career around the life you want, not the other way around.
04What are the biggest challenges or opportunities in your field right now?
The biggest opportunity in veterinary medicine is to really push the envelope in terms of providing services that expand access to care for pet families. My company, DVM STAT, really fills that gap by enhancing pet owners' access to board-certified specialty care while they continue to work with the vet that they trust, who's right down the street from them. It allows every veterinarian to have a team of 45 specialists virtually that help to support their hospital and what they can provide there without having to hire and have an increased overhead at their practice. Financial restrictions are such a common problem in veterinary medicine that often limit pet owners' ability to provide the care that they want to their pets, and we really serve to mitigate that by making our consultations affordable and accessible to everyone.
05What values are most important to you in your work and personal life?
Honesty and integrity guide everything I do, in medicine and at home. In veterinary medicine, that means giving families the full picture even when it's a hard conversation, and holding my team to the same standard of care I'd want for my own pets. Family is part of that same standard. Being honest with myself about what I can take on, as a mother of three and as the founder of a growing company, is what has let me build something I'm proud of without losing sight of the people I built it for.
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