BEVA celebrates vet talent with 2024 awards
Phillippa Pritchard received the 2024 Nurse Empowerment Award.
The British Equine Veterinary Association (BEVA) has honoured achievements in the equine veterinary sector at an awards ceremony during its 2024 congress.
The ceremony saw BEVA president Roger Smith present the accolades alongside Olympic gold medallist Sally Gunnell, who also gave the congress’ opening address.
This year’s BEVA Equine Welfare Award, sponsored by the Blue Cross, was awarded to Jan Rogers. The prestigious award recognised her work at the Horse Trust, where she champions funded research work that is directly applicable to the wellbeing of horses.
In 2022, this saw the launch of the Horse Trust’s Weigh to Win project. The project aims to raise awareness of body condition in show horses by educating horse owners and rewarding healthy equine body condition with a special rosette.
The Horse Trust runs events throughout showing season, providing guidance to owners, riders and producers at the events and through online webinars.
BEVA’s Nurse Empowerment Award was first awarded last year and is designed to highlight team members who champion the role of equine nurses.
The winner of the 2024 Nurse Empowerment Award is Phillippa Pritchard. With over 20 years experience promoting clinical excellence among equine veterinary nurses, Ms Pritchard continues to support nursing teams, supervise trainees and teach within the equine hospital.
Her recent research, published in Vet Record, explored horse owners’ perceptions of registered veterinary nurses (RVNs). It is credited with driving significant change for RVNs, including the introduction of unaccompanied RVN visits.
The BEVA Richard Hartley Clinical Award recognised the work of Francesco Comino, for research exploring tension relieving techniques when closing traumatic equine wounds.
The Peter Rossdale Equine Veterinary Journal Open Award highlighted research produced by Brooke Boger. Meanwhile the new Peter Rossdale EVE Literary Award went to Camilla Lydiksen, who led research analysing the effect antibiotics had on dental sinusitis after a dental extraction.
BEVA will continue assessing clinical research entries for the Sam Hignett Award through a series of Clinical Research Sessions. The winner of the award will be announced after BEVA Congress.
Image © BEVA
The BSAVA has opened submissions for the BSAVA Clinical Research Abstracts 2026.
