July 2026
In this VETgirl online veterinary continuing education blog, Dr. Natalie Marks, CVJ, CCFP, Elite FFCP-V explains why patient discharge is a critical, often broken, process. Learn five practical workflow shifts to standardize protocols, leverage technology, and create clear communication plans that improve patient outcomes, boost compliance, and reduce staff burnout.

Discharge Is the Last Word: Five Workflow Fixes Your Hospital Will Actually Feel

By Dr. Natalie Marks, CVJ, CCFP, Elite FFCP-V

The first time I really understood discharge, I was not wearing scrubs. I sat in a vinyl chair next to my mom’s hospital bed, watching a nurse rip through a stack of papers and a medication list at warp speed while my mom nodded politely and remembered almost none of it.

She had been admitted three times in quick succession. By the third discharge, I had a notebook, a color-coded pill chart, and a running list of every instruction that contradicted the previous one. I also had a humbling new appreciation for what our clients face every day in our hospitals.

Discharge is the final word. It is the moment that determines whether a patient recovers as planned, whether a client trusts us enough to return, and whether our team has a peaceful evening or a phone tree full of “quick questions.” Done well, it improves compliance, reduces callbacks, and leaves clients feeling cared for even when outcomes are difficult. Done poorly, it undermines much of the excellent medicine we provide.

The good news is that discharge is one of the most fixable parts of our day. Here are five workflow shifts, grounded in recent research, that any practice can begin testing this month.

1. Standardize Your Discharge Protocols

Most discharge inconsistencies do not stem from bad clinicians. They stem from the fact that every clinician writes instructions from scratch, in real time, at the end of a long day. That is a recipe for missed details, mixed messaging among doctors, and exhausted technicians trying to translate five different communication styles into one client conversation.

Standardization is the solution. Build a core template for each common procedure (spay/neuter, dental, GI workup, chronic disease starts, orthopedic recovery) and leave a small space at the bottom for the clinician’s personalized notes. The bones stay consistent. The voice stays human.

The AAHA 2023 Technician Utilization Guidelines lay this out in Table 5.2, “Standardized Workflow for Optimal Utilization,” which identifies where protocols can systematize repetitive, high-volume work: triage calls, follow-up calls for surgical cases and recent hospitalizations, nutritional and behavioral consults, and preapproved diagnostics.1 The same logic applies directly to discharge. A 2025 study by Rohlf and colleagues at La Trobe University found that transparent, client-centered communication was one of the strongest predictors of client satisfaction in veterinary practice, even after accounting for the seriousness of the presenting issue.2 Standardized discharge instructions are transparency in action.

2. Pre-Prepare Your Discharge Materials

In human medicine, discharge includes a packet. Medication schedule. Activity restrictions. Red-flag signs. A clear phone number for “call us if.” In veterinary medicine, discharge often comes with whatever the technician can pull together while the client is already at the front desk asking about parking validation.

The bottleneck is almost never the conversation. It is the prep. Prescriptions are not filled. Invoices are not finalized. Go-home kits are not assembled. Handouts are not printed. Every one of those gaps is paid for in client waiting time and team stress.

The 2023 “State of Emergency and Specialty Veterinary Care” report from Instinct Science found meaningful adoption of supportive technology in ER and specialty hospitals: 38% added digital treatment sheets, 36% moved to cloud-based PIMS/EMR, and 32% adopted client communication platforms in the prior year, with 75% of staff reporting positive improvements from the new technology.3 In a 2024 Journal of Veterinary Internal Medicine study, Flegel and colleagues tested how well clients of a neurological referral center could recall the information given to them at discharge.4 The answer was: only partially. Clients consistently could not reproduce key portions of what they were told. The authors recommended that important instructions be specifically emphasized, which is exactly what pre-prepared, pre-tested materials make possible.

3. Assign Someone (or Some Time) to Own Discharge

Discharge falls apart when it is everyone’s job and no one’s job. When it gets squeezed in between appointments, dropped on whichever technician happens to be free, or rushed because a doctor needs the exam room back, it stops being a care moment and becomes a transaction.

The Instinct Science 2023 report points in a related direction: hospitals that invested in workflow tools and clearer team structures saw better retention and morale, and technology adoption alone was linked to 10 to 15% higher employee retention.3 Role clarity is part of that same picture.

This does not require a new hire. It requires a small structural decision: who owns discharge during your busiest blocks, and when does it happen?

4. Let Technology Carry the Repetitive Load

Our industry has been slow to adopt tools, and I understand why. Change is hard, budgets are tight, and we have all been burned by software that promised the moon and delivered a slightly worse version of paper. But the data is now clear: integrated technology meaningfully reduces the burden of repetitive, documentation-heavy work, especially during discharge.

Two-way communication tools, veterinary copilot platforms, templated digital workflows, e-signature for consents, automated text reminders, and shareable care plans all do the same thing. They take low-value tasks off your team’s plate and give clients the consistent, accessible information they need to follow through at home.

The Rohlf et al. 2025 study reinforces this from a different angle.2 The authors found that trauma-informed care principles, which they broke into five components (transparent and client-centered communication, client supports and strengths, emotional safety and empowerment, physical safety and comfort, and informed consent), significantly predicted both client satisfaction and reduced client disappointment. Integrated technology is one of the most practical ways to operationalize those principles at scale.

5. Build a Post-Discharge Communication Protocol

Discharge is not the end of recovery. It is the beginning of recovery at home, where the doctor cannot see what is happening, and the client is doing their best with a notebook and a Google search. Follow-up is where you protect your medicine.

The fix is a protocol, not a vibe. Schedule recheck appointments before the client leaves the building, then confirm them by text. Automate a 24- to 48-hour check-in for every medical and surgical discharge. Include a clear “when to call us” section in every discharge document. Give clients a consistent, low-friction way to reach you, whether that is a phone line, a secure chat, or a triage partner.

Speaking of triage partners, if your hospital is not yet using one, now is the time to look. Several reputable veterinary triage services now serve as an extension of your team, handling pet parent questions 24/7 and giving your staff their evenings back. The team satisfaction win is real, and so is the reduction in preventable ER visits.

Where to Start Tomorrow Morning

Optimizing discharge is not about adding more work. It is about removing friction from the work you are already doing, so the last thing your client experiences is clarity rather than confusion.

If you want a practical place to begin:

  1. Audit your current discharge process. Map each step, time each step, and gather feedback from the team and clients.
  2. Select one or two of the five fixes above. Standardized instructions and a named discharge owner are usually the highest-leverage starting points.
  3. Pilot the change for two to four weeks. Gather feedback. Refine.
  4. Then scale. Bake it into your software, formalize the roles, and train every new hire.

Sitting in that vinyl chair next to my mom, I did not want more information. I wanted clarity, consistency, and the feeling that someone had thought this through before I arrived at the worst moment of my week. Our clients want the same thing for their pets. Discharge is where we either give it to them or we do not.

References:

  1. Heather Prendergast RV, CVPM S, Mages A, Rauscher CJ, Roth LC, Thompson M, Thompson ST, Yagi RK. 2023 AAHA Technician Utilization Guidelines.
  2. Rohlf VI, Manfrenuzzi N, Rehman N, et al. Exploration of Client Experiences of Veterinary Care for Companion Animals (Dogs and Cats) and the Impact of Trauma-Informed Care on Client Outcomes. Vet Sci. 2025;12(8):709. doi: 10.3390/vetsci12080709.
  3. Instinct Science. (2023). The State of Emergency and Specialty Veterinary Care in 2023. Summary coverage: dvm360 and BusinessWire.
  4. Flegel T, Dobersek K, Bayer S, et al. Client’s understanding of instructions for small animals in a veterinary neurological referral center. J Vet Intern Med. 2024;38(3):1639-1650. doi: 10.1111/jvim.17085. Epub 2024.

 

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