The RCVS Compassion Award

The RCVS Compassion Award was first bestowed in 2021, to reflect the focus of the RCVS on compassion, as part of the 2020-2024 Strategic Plan.

It will be awarded to a veterinary surgeon or veterinary nurse at any stage of their career who has demonstrated compassion towards fellow professionals and/or members of the animal-owning public. This may be as part of a one-off initiative or sustained over a longer period of time, but the individual needs to have made a significant impact and shown genuine compassion above and beyond what might have been expected of them as part of their day-to-day work.

Although showing compassion to animals is a key part of a veterinary professional’s role, this award is to recognise compassion towards our fellow human beings.

Nominations can be made by any MRCVS or RVN, excluding current RCVS Council and VN Council members. Nominees must be MsRCVS or RVNs, also excluding current RCVS Council and VN Council members.

The nomination period for the 2025 RCVS Honours & Awards in now open. Nominations close at 5pm on Friday 13 December 2024. To nominate somebody for the Compassion Award, please download the nomination form at the bottom of this page.

Please note, to fill out the form you will need to open it using Adobe Acrobat, edit it, then save it, and send it back to us. If you experience any issues with the form, please send the information requested on the form in a word document instead, to Antalena Alexandre, Executive Assistant to the CEO, on [email protected].

 This award is also open to self-nomination. If you are self-nominating, please be sure to complete this form in the third person using your own name and preferred pronouns in place of 'I' to avoid bias.

Successful nominees for RCVS Honours & Awards will be announced in March 2025 and invited to attend Royal College Day in July 2025. 

Previous Compassion Award winners

2024: Timothy Sandys MRCVS, was nominated for starting the Gloucester branch of Street Vet, a charity in which vets and veterinary nurses offer free essential veterinary services to the pets of people experiencing homelessness and continues to be the branch’s team leader.

2022: Glen Cousquer MRCVS, was recognised for his role as a founding member of the Campus Mental Health and Wellbeing Committee at the University of Edinburgh where he works as an MSc Programme Coordinator in Conservation Medicine. In his role as Chair of the Committee he has led and supported a team that provides a regular programme of events to promote staff and student mental health and wellbeing and has also helped to promote a culture of compassion across the wider university. 

2022: Katie Moore VN MRCVS, was recognised for her role as a Trustee of the Vetlife charity, which provides mental health and emotional support to the veterinary professions, and particularly as Chair of the charity's Vetlife Health Support Programme and Vetlife Helpline, for which she provides strategic leadership and governance. Among Katie's key achievements has been the commissioning and development of the Vetlife Health Support Service which offers bespoke professional mental health support to vets, veterinary nurses and students. 

2021: Dr David Martin MRCVS, a veterinary surgeon and partner at the Brownlow Veterinary Group in Shropshire who has been described as a consistent advocate for pet, client and team welfare within the non-accidental injury (NAI) field for many years, helping practitioners to identify the signs of NAI. His nominator Dr Jacqueline Seymour MRCVS, a VetsNow district veterinary surgeon who sits with Dr Martin on the IVC UK Welfare group, says he contributed his knowledge and personal time during the pandemic to provide direct support to veterinary teams in his own time on recognising NAI, as well as leading parliamentary discussion, online webinar training and production of additional resources to aid teams in these situations.

2021: Olivia Wassell RVN, has worked at the Blue Cross Animal Hospital in Hammersmith, London, since late 2019 and has been praised by her colleagues for her professionalism, positive attitude and dedication to animal health and welfare as a relatively new member of staff working under difficult conditions during the pandemic. Her nominator Dominique Mitchell RVN said Olivia faced the challenges of the pandemic with a completely open mind and flexibility and that she had been a great support to numerous team members familiar and unfamiliar.