TVMA Equine Practitioner of the Year
by Marisa Plumb
Dr. Gene White of Roanoke was named TVMA’s Equine Practitioner of the Year for 2006, in recognition of a long and diversified veterinary career in North Texas. As a lifelong Texan and lover of horses, veterinary medicine, hunting, and equine sports, Dr. White serves as testimony to the idea that professional and personal passions can converge into one.
Dr. White graduated from College of Veterinary Medicine at Texas A&M in 1966, at which point he and his wife Glenna (also his high school sweetheart) moved to Euless to start a life in veterinary practice. For a few years, Dr. White worked with one other veterinarian – Dr. Dick Thomes – to run a mixed animal practice known as the Euless Animal Hospital. As his partner worked mostly with small animals, there were was a broad range of clients and services for Dr. White to cover as a practitioner increasingly interested in working primarily with horses.
The Growth of a Practice
“You really do a little bit of everything. I worked seven days a week for years when I started out, and I did things that I wouldn’t try on my own now,” Dr. White recalled. “Things I wouldn’t recommend. But when you start off, you say to yourself, if someone else can do it, I can do it.”
Dr. White discussed the state of the large animal practitioner, and his experiences in equine medicine, within the changing and expanding landscape of the Dallas area. When he started out, there were few other equine practitioners in the Dallas / Fort Worth Metroplex area.
Perhaps this is because many people do not want the kind of lifestyle demanded of an equine practitioner, especially the lifestyle of a solo practitioner. Dr. White noted that the demands and challenges of large animal veterinarians require a lot of flexibility and long hours.
“When the business was smaller, and the only other vet working with me was doing mostly small animal, I was on call all the time. When we hired the third guy, we were each on call half the time. Once we were four, there was better rotation for being on call,” Dr. White said.
But the addition of other veterinarians to Dr. White’s practice didn’t happen overnight. It happened over four decades. His practice added a fifth associate a little over a year ago, and the fourth just over five years ago.
“Now we work five or six days a week, but we don’t get in until 10, 11, 12 at night,” Dr. White said. “You still put in the hours.”
Although Dr. White noted that most people prefer the predictability of a 9-4 job, he said that he couldn’t imagine having a career based in an office setting. He said, in fact, that the diversity, mobility, and unpredictability of his daily life have been his favorite aspects of equine veterinary practice.
“To be a successful equine practitioner, you’re always addressing a different problem, and for me that’s better than sitting in an office,” he said. “The only part I don’t like about my job is the paperwork.”
Dr. White grew up around horses, and said that he didn’t even know there were animal doctors other than those who treated horses prior to his schooling. They were the only kinds of veterinarians he had seen.
At the time that Dr. White attended veterinary school, students didn’t choose a specialization, but rather, they all took the required courses. “Any specialization was on your own; it was where you hung around,” Dr. White explained. “I hung around the large animal department until they got tired of seeing me.”
And that was the way that Dr. White got his experience. Whereas students now have opportunities to do externships or spend a few weeks at a race track, Dr. White said that his fellow students just found summer jobs where they could, or where they had to.
A New Location, the Same Passions
Dr. White, Glenna, and their two young children (son Brad and daughter Dana) decided to move to Roanoke in 1973, where Dr. White established Diamond W Equine Services. The office is on their property, behind their home. They treat many racehorses and jumpers, servicing an area around Roanoke with a radius of up to 100 miles. “On a typical day, at least one of us will drive 60 miles out,” Dr. White said.
Other important interests in Dr. White’s life include horse racing, rodeo competitions, and hunting. All of these sports have always been an integral part of Dr. White’s family, friendships, and his surrounding Texas culture.
Dr. White has been showing and racing horses ever since high school. He continued to show horses in college, and for many years afterwards. The Whites have raced several successful quarter horses over the years, and won the 2003 All-American Derby with a horse named Snow Big Deal. During his career, Snow Big Deal earned $407,000 in racing. Another one of their prized horses was named Heart of Darkness.
When they tired of showing horses, Dr. White said that his friend suggested they try ‘bulldogging.’ I have to admit, the Whites gave me a very strange look when I confessed that I didn’t know what ‘bulldogging’ was. Dr. White’s bewilderment increased when I said I didn’t know what it meant to hook a steer.
“Where are you from?” he asked, laughing. He graciously showed me photos of some rodeo action. Dr. White said that his decision to get into ‘rodeoing’ had been simple – his friend suggested it, and he said, “Sure, let’s try that.”
Even though many of his friends were injured in the sport, Dr. White was lucky and participated for years without injury.
For the Good of the Profession
Dr. White attended a class reunion at Texas A&M three months ago. The dean of the college, who was also in Dr. White’s class, told the group that in veterinary schools nationwide, about eighty percent of the students are currently women. Dr. White said that he’s not sure what will happen to the large animal profession, simply because over the years he has seen most women choose small animal practice. Small animal practice, by nature, affords practitioners a more manageable schedule, and more veterinarians overall are going that direction.
“I just don’t know who’s going to go pull a calf in North Dakota at 2 a.m. after my generation and the generation behind me is gone. I don’t even want to do that,” Dr. White said.
Dr. White and a few other concerned colleagues worked with the College of Veterinary Medicine at Texas A&M to create a rural veterinarian scholarship fund. But as Dr. White pointed out, “You can give a student a scholarship to go back to their hometown and practice, or into some other rural practice, but you can’t guarantee that’s the lifestyle they will ultimately choose.”
The scholarship was originally going to be named after Dr. William M. Romane, Dr. White’s mentor throughout veterinary school and afterwards. Once he was practicing on his own, much of Dr. White’s encouragement and advice came from Dr. Romane, who was head of the large animal department at A&M while Dr. White was in school.
“He was always willing,” Dr. White recalled. “Some professors are really good, but they’re professors. Romane was a practitioner before he was an instructor – I think that’s important. You know the medical stuff, but you also need to know the practice situations. I thought Romane had a practitioner’s mentality. He wasn’t out to discover anything new, just to educate kids to be good practitioners.”
Because the number of equine practitioners around him used to be few or none, Dr. White’s only choice when he was in a bind was to call back to the college at A&M. Dr. Romane was always the one that answered his questions.
“Don’t ever let a bunch of lab work mess up a good diagnosis you’ve made by your observation,” Dr. Romane used to say.
Around 30 years ago, in order to initiate more dialogue among the equine veterinarians in North Texas, Dr. White and a few other colleagues noticed the need for an association in the area where equine issues could be addressed, so they started an organization specifically for North Texas. Dr. White said that he used to go to the Tarrant and Dallas County meetings, but they only talked about small animal issues.
There are now a growing number of large animal veterinarians around the Metroplex because in general, it is an area where standard fees are easier to maintain. Dr. White said that if you go 60 miles north of Roanoke, the fees are lower. People are simply gravitating to the Dallas / Fort Worth area because there is more work. “In rural area, I would have to do dogs, cats, and some cattle in order to make living,” Dr. White said.
Regardless of where it took place, Dr. White said he chose the only career path that he ever really considered. Which makes sense – as an equine practitioner, Dr. White was able to develop his interests, background, and talents as an individual simultaneously. This Practitioner of the Year award recognizes the contributions that his dedicated pursuits have made to the field of equine medicine.
