Kevin Fitzgerald

Last updated

Kevin Terrel Fitzgerald (born September 23, 1951), an American veterinarian who works at Alameda East Veterinary Hospital in his native Denver, Colorado is best known through his visibility on the Animal Planet reality show Emergency Vets and, more recently, E-Vet Interns . Fitzgerald also does stand-up comedy and a little tap dancing. In 2001, he was named one of the 50 most eligible bachelors by People . [1]

Contents

Examining a couple of his patients. Kevin Fitzgerald.JPG
Examining a couple of his patients.

Past jobs and positions

Kevin Fitzgerald was formerly a teacher at the University of Hawaii. On summers off, he worked as security for a wide variety of musical acts, such as Elvis Presley, The Who, Bob Marley, Willie Nelson, George Clinton, and The Rolling Stones. On an episode of Emergency Vets , Fitzgerald noted that he knew it was time to get serious about pursuing a career in veterinary medicine when Keith Richards of the Rolling Stones asked him if he wanted to "still be a bouncer at 50". [1]

Fitzgerald joined the staff of Alameda East, a 24-hour facility equipped to provide emergency care, in 1985. He also once served as president of the Denver Area Veterinary Medical Society while he was on the board of directors of the Rocky Mountain Poison and Drug Center.

Current jobs and positions

Fitzgerald is a veterinarian at Alameda East Veterinary Hospital, where the Animal Planet television series Emergency Vets and its follow-up E-Vet Interns were filmed. For the past 25 years, he has been an assistant professor adjunct at the University of Denver, where he teaches a course called "Perspectives in Veterinary Medicine". He also serves as a veterinary consultant for the Aurora, Colorado police department's K-9 division. He has written chapters in medical texts on subjects such as emergency veterinarian medicine, toxicology, and reptile medicine and surgery.

Fitzgerald is also a regular on the Denver-area stand-up comedy circuit, where he is billed as "the hardest working veterinarian in show business". An episode of Emergency Vets entitled "Fitz's Day" showed snippets of his stand-up act. "Everybody laughed when I said I wanted to do comedy", Fitzgerald noted dryly, "but no one's laughing now."[ citation needed ]

On August 11, 2007, Fitzgerald was a "Not My Job" guest on NPR's "Wait Wait ... Don't Tell Me". He told stories about Keith Richards ("when Keith Richards suggests you're wasting your life, you gotta listen"), his fear of spiders and then correctly answered all three questions regarding BALCO founder Victor Conte. The segment has been replayed on several of Wait Wait ... Don't Tell Me's "best of" and compilation episodes; [2] as of February 2017, this is the most-repeated guest segment of the show. [3]

After Emergency Vets ceased production in 2002, Fitzgerald occasionally appeared in a set of pet health reminder PSAs on Animal Planet called "Animal Tips With Dr. Fitz". He also appeared in PSAs for the Animal Planet animal welfare project "ROAR" (Reach Out, Act, Respond).

In 2007, Fitzgerald and the rest of the Alameda East team returned to prime-time television in a new Animal Planet series, E-Vet Interns. On the new series, Fitzgerald continually stresses the importance of exposing young vets to experiences with exotic animals such as snakes and other reptiles, as well as showing young vets how to give back to their community by providing services for "working animals" such as police dogs.

Stalking

Vicki Tenney, a West Virginia woman, began stalking Fitzgerald in 1999. She began by writing fan letters and in 2002, relocated to Denver and made death threats against Fitzgerald. [4] By Christmas in 2004, Tenney was calling Fitzgerald daily saying she was going to kill him and had purchased a coffin for him. [5] At a hearing in January 2006, she was deemed unfit to stand trial and ordered into treatment.

On October 27, 2006, Tenney was sentenced to 18 months of probation, obtain mental health treatment, and ordered to stay away from Fitzgerald and Alameda East Veterinary Hospital in a plea bargain in which she pleaded guilty to violating a restraining order. Doctors deemed Tenney more suitable to stand trial since her treatment began, but the prosecutor of the case, stating that she believed the disposition was appropriate, declined to bring Tenney to trial as long as Tenney continues to follow the requirements of her probation. [5]

Related Research Articles

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Veterinary medicine</span> Deals with the diseases of animals

Veterinary medicine is the branch of medicine that deals with the prevention, management, diagnosis, and treatment of disease, disorder, and injury in animals. Along with this, it deals with animal rearing, husbandry, breeding, research on nutrition, and product development. The scope of veterinary medicine is wide, covering all animal species, both domesticated and wild, with a wide range of conditions that can affect different species.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Veterinarian</span> Health professional who treats animals

A veterinarian (vet) is a medical professional who practices veterinary medicine. They manage a wide range of health conditions and injuries in non-human animals. Along with this, veterinarians also play a role in animal reproduction, health management, conservation, husbandry and breeding and preventive medicine like nutrition, vaccination and parasitic control as well as biosecurity and zoonotic disease surveillance and prevention.

Emergency Vets is a reality television series that airs on the U.S. cable network Animal Planet. First aired in 1998, it depicts the working and outside lives of the veterinarians at Alameda East Veterinary Hospital in Denver, Colorado, USA, plus the animals that they treat. At its peak of popularity, Emergency Vets alternated with The Crocodile Hunter as Animal Planet's most popular show.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Egg binding</span> Health problem in birds/other egg-layers

Egg binding occurs in animals, such as reptiles or birds, when an egg takes longer than usual to pass out of the reproductive tract.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Alameda East Veterinary Hospital</span> Veterinary hospital in Colorado, USA

Bruce Fogle, is a vet and author of pet care books and travel narratives. Canadian by birth, he has lived and worked in London for over 40 years.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Royal (Dick) School of Veterinary Studies</span>

The Royal (Dick) School of Veterinary Studies, commonly referred to as the Dick Vet, is the University of Edinburgh's vet school. It is part of the College of Medicine and Veterinary Medicine.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Michigan State University College of Veterinary Medicine</span>

The Michigan State University College of Veterinary Medicine (CVM) is a veterinary college in the United States that was founded in 1910 and awards about 100 Doctor of Veterinary Medicine (DVM) degrees each year. It is the only veterinary college in Michigan. It is composed of the departments of Large Animal Clinical Sciences, Small Animal Clinical Sciences, Microbiology, Pharmacology and Toxicology, Physiology, and Pathobiology and Diagnostic Investigation. It offers a four-year program leading to the DVM as well as graduate study leading to the Master of Science (MS) and PhD, and recently a joint program in veterinary medicine and public health (DVM/MPH), affiliated with University of Minnesota's School of Public Health. It also runs an accredited veterinary technology program, the equivalent of a human nursing program, that offers options for a Bachelor of Science degree or a certificate of completion. The college was the setting for the show Vet School Confidential, which originally aired on Animal Planet in 2001.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Veterinary acupuncture</span>

Veterinary acupuncture is a form of traditional Chinese medicine and a pseudoscientific practice of performing acupuncture on animals. The best studies of the effects of animal acupuncture have produced consistently negative results.

Dr. Jeff Werber, DVM is an American veterinarian and veterinary medical journalist. Werber has hosted the television series Lassie's Pet Vet, as well as appearing as a pet-topic contributor on such programs as The Dr. Oz Show, Rachael Ray, and Fox & Friends.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Veterinary chiropractic</span>

Veterinary chiropractic, also known as animal chiropractic, is chiropractic for animals – a type of spinal manipulation. Veterinary chiropractors typically treat horses, racing greyhounds, and pets. Veterinary chiropractic is a controversial method due to a lack of evidence as to the efficacy of chiropractic methods. Contrary to traditional medicine, chiropractic therapies are alternative medicine. There is some degree of risk associated with even skilled manipulation in animals as the potential for injury exists with any technique used. The founder of chiropractic, Daniel David Palmer, used the method on animals, partly to challenge claims that the placebo effect was responsible for favorable results in humans. Chiropractic treatment of large animals dates back to the early 1900s. As of 2019, many states in the US provide statutory or regulatory guidelines for the practice of chiropractic and related treatments on animals, generally requiring some form of veterinary involvement.

<i>Bondi Vet</i> Australian factual TV series

Bondi Vet is an Australian factual television series. It follows the lives of veterinary surgeon Chris Brown at the Bondi Junction Veterinary Hospital, and emergency veterinarian Lisa Chimes at the Small Animal Specialist Hospital (SASH), in the Sydney suburb of North Ryde.

Matthew Brash is a British veterinarian and television presenter. Brash began his career at the Flamingo Land zoo around 1991. He has been a TV presenter or star in the TV programmes Zoo Vet, Zoo Vet At Large, Vets to the Rescue, and Vets in the Country on BBC and ITV1. He wrote the book Zoo Vet about the situations he encountered as a veterinarian.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Chris Brown (veterinarian)</span> Australian veterinarian and television presenter (born 1978)

Chris Brown is an Australian veterinarian, television presenter and author. He is best known for the television series Bondi Vet, which began screening in 2009. He hosted The Open Road with Doctor Chris on CBS. In Australia, he appeared on the lifestyle program The Living Room, and alongside Julia Morris was the presenter of the local version of I'm a Celebrity...Get Me Out of Here!.

Veterinary ethics is a system of moral principles that apply values and judgements to the practice of veterinary medicine. As a scholarly discipline, veterinary ethics encompasses its practical application in clinical settings as well as work on its history, philosophy, theology, and sociology. Veterinary ethics combines veterinary professional ethics and the subject of animal ethics. The subject of veterinary ethics can be interpreted as an extension of critical thinking skills necessary to make the decisions in veterinary care in order to support the profession's responsibilities to animal kind and mankind.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Veterinary medicine in the United States</span> Medical treatment of animals in the United States

Veterinary medicine in the United States is the performance of veterinary medicine in the United States, normally performed by licensed professionals, and subject to provisions of statute law which vary by state. Veterinary medicine is normally led by veterinary physicians, termed veterinarians or vets, but also by paraveterinary workers, such as veterinary technicians, and veterinary assistants. This can be augmented by other paraprofessionals with specific specialties, such as animal physiotherapy or dentistry, and species-relevant roles such as farriers.

<i>The Incredible Dr. Pol</i> American reality television series

The Incredible Dr. Pol is an American reality television show on Nat Geo Wild that follows Dutch-American veterinarian Jan Pol and his family and employees at his practice in rural Weidman, Michigan. The series premiered October 29, 2011 and has two seasons every year.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Scott Sims (veterinarian)</span> American veterinarian and television personality

Scott Sims DVM was an American veterinarian and television personality. He is best known for his factual television series Aloha Vet, which aired in 2015.

<i>Dr. T, Lone Star Vet</i> American TV series or program

Dr. T, Lone Star Vet is an American television series on the Nat Geo Wild network. It premiered on October 13, 2019, and follows Lauren Thielen, the titular Dr. T, and the veterinarians and staff of the Texas Avian & Exotic Animal Hospital located in Grapevine, Texas.

References

  1. 1 2 Neth, Alex (December 2001). "Kevin Fitzgerald: Rock and Roll Animal Mechanic" . Retrieved July 3, 2007.
  2. Presenter: Peter Sagal (August 11, 2007). "Not My Job: Dr. Kevin Fitzgerald". Wait Wait ... Don't Tell Me. NPR. Retrieved 2018-08-26.
  3. "Wait Wait... Don't Tell Me! Stats and Show Details". Wait Wait... Don't Tell Me! Stats and Show Details. August 26, 2018.
  4. "Woman Accused Of Stalking Star Veterinarian". KMGH-TV News. March 22, 2005. Retrieved July 3, 2007.
  5. 1 2 Pankratz, Howard (January 23, 2006). "Woman ruled unfit for trial in vet's stalking". The Denver Post . Retrieved August 26, 2018.