Dr. Karsten brings 35 years of vet experience to Kalona

By Molly Roberts
Posted 8/3/21

After working part-time at the Veterinary Clinic for the past five years, Dr. Arlin Karsten has joined the practice full time. He brings 35 years of experience in veterinary medicine to the practice, …

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Dr. Karsten brings 35 years of vet experience to Kalona

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After working part-time at the Veterinary Clinic for the past five years, Dr. Arlin Karsten has joined the practice full time. He brings 35 years of experience in veterinary medicine to the practice, joining Dr. Sheldon Yoder and Dr. Marvin Slabaugh in caring for the community’s pets and animals.

Karsten works a lot in preventative care, which includes everything from vaccinations to nutrition to wellness checkups.

“One thing that has probably been the biggest change during my career is nutrition and dental health. When I got out of vet school, 10-12 years was an average life expectancy for a dog or cat,” Karsten said. “Now, we see pets that are routinely living twice that long and a lot of that is due to the breakthroughs we’ve seen in nutrition.”

“People commonly say that a pet is part of the family and what it boils down to is that they can give their pet a longer quality of life with them together if we get all the preventative health things put into place. It’s really enjoyable to see people come in who have grown up with a dog or cat and they’ve had it for 20 years and get very attached to them.”

Karsten said pets go through phases of their life that need different levels of care. When an animal is young, they’ll be seen anywhere from three to five times before they’re even four months old.

“The first year of life is really critical,” Karsten said. “We work with them a lot then. Then, in the middle years, we still want to see them every year to do an annual exam. That’s one thing I really enjoy about working here — if someone has concerns, we’re a small enough clinic that we can either talk to them or they can run the pet in quick and we can check them.”

Then, Karsten said, when the animals start getting into their senior years, around eight to ten years old, they should start having more regular checkups so the veterinarians can monitor their aging.

“It’s a huge thing that has really changed during my career — I never would have imagined that we would have in-house laboratory tests that we have now. We can draw blood and test the kidney function, the liver function and everything else,” Karsten said. “As those pets get older, we try to emphasize to people that we ought to start checking on that, see how the pets are doing, see if we need to make any changes to the nutrition or things like that. People do look at their pets as lifelong members of their family and it really starts giving us some background and information that can help them make decisions as the pets get older.”

What sets the Kalona Veterinary Clinic apart for Karsten is the practice’s dedication to working with the pet owners to make decisions.

“When I think about wellness, we’re not only looking at the pet, but we work with the people, too,” he said. “The decisions the people need to make, whatever their situation is, we support them in that, versus just saying, ‘This is what you need to do.’ I really enjoy working with the people. It’s a wonderful community here.”

Karsten said all the staff at the clinic, from the veterinarians to the veterinary technicians, to the reception staff are all part of the care team, dedicated to helping the people of Kalona give their animals the best possible life they can have.

“When people come in here, we try to look at things not just as, ‘Here’s a dog we’re going to treat,’ but we know that people have strong emotional ties to their pets,” Karsten said. “Now, particularly with COVID, we’re seeing just how good parts are for people’s mental wellbeing… In my opinion, animals are becoming more important in people’s lives. They have influence in people’s lives all the time.”