Here at A Cat Clinic, giving back to our community in the Germantown area is very important. We started this page as a way of sharing with you our latest activities.
Our ongoing programs include:
- Working with Animal Welfare League of Montgomery County. This rescue group places many stray and unwanted cats in forever homes. We help provide medical care for cats that are in need, and when our clients donate cat food to our clinic that they no longer need, we pass that along to AWLMC. Every December, we hold a Cat Food Drive, to collect supplies for the organization.
Aurora’s Angels Fund. We started this tax-deductible account in memory of our hospital cat, Aurora, who passed away in 2015. Donations to this fund are used to help families and cats who need care but need assistance in covering the costs. A portion of every Wellness Exam fee we collect is donated to the fund. So by taking good care of your own cat, you are also helping others!- High School Intern Program. A Cat Clinic has partnered with local high schools to give students an opportunity to observe the workings of a veterinary hospital. Many of these interns have gone on to become employees, giving us the opportunity to provide jobs for local students.
- Complimentary first exam for cats adopted from our local shelters, Montgomery County Animal Control and Adoption Services and Montgomery County Humane Society.
- Educational talks for the community. All our doctors enjoy educating people on how to keep their cats healthy and happy. Drs. Mustillo and Dr. DeBernardis especially enjoy speaking about feline behavior. They have given talks to local humane groups, students, and our own clients and their friends and families. Please let us know if you are interested in having one of our doctors speak to your group.
Below are updates on some of the various activities we have participated in.
2019
During the holiday season we held our 6th annual Holiday Cat Food Drive benefiting the Animal Welfare League of Montgomery County. Thanks to our fantastic and generous clients, we gathered an amazing amount of food for felines in need!
AWLMC is a wonderful organization that helps many local cats find new forever homes, and they can always use our help. So thank you all for helping us support this rescue organization in their efforts to care for cats who are still looking for their forever homes!
Losing a pet is such a difficult and emotional time for all of us. Here at A Cat Clinic, we try to pay tribute to our feline friends who have recently passed by making a donation to the Winn Feline Foundation in their memory. The Winn Feline Foundation is a wonderful organization who’s mission is to advance feline health by supporting research and education. The organization uses almost all of the donations received to support that mission with minimal overhead costs. For 2019, in addition to all the various research projects going on around the world, they awarded two scholarships. These were given to veterinary students who focus on feline clinical practice and research science, which are vital to feline health and welfare. Many of you are aware that we make donations to this organization, so we just wanted to update you on some of the ways those donations are being put to good use.
Another Career Day! Dr. Rubenstein spoke to the fifth grade class at McAuliffe Elementary School in Germantown, MD on May 10. The class was very engaged and asked some excellent questions! We always enjoy sharing our veterinary stories and hope we can help inspire the next generation.
Dr. Rubenstein spoke to an enthusiastic first grade class for Career Day at Germantown, Elementary School in Germantown, MD on April 16, 2019. They learned a little about life as a veterinarian. The children are always excited to tell stories about their own cats!
Once again, Dr. Rubenstein visited Ridgeview Middle School in Gaithersburg, MD on March 13, 2019. She was the featured guest speaker in their ongoing program, Career Info Lunches, that interested students can sign up to participate in. Dr, Rubenstein met with a small group of students who wanted to learn more about Veterinary Medicine. She is always happy to share her experience and knowledge to help today’s youth share in her passion for feline medicine.
2018
Our wonderful clients have done it again! During the holiday season we held our annual Holiday Cat Food Drive benefiting the Animal Welfare League of Montgomery County. This year we raised over $400 and collected over 400 lbs of food, treats and kitty litter.
AWLMC is a wonderful organization that helps many local cats find new forever homes, and they can always use our help. So thank you all for helping us support this rescue organization in their efforts to care for cats who are still looking for their forever homes!
A Cat Clinic hosted an Open House on Saturday, June 23. We love showing off our beautiful facility and demonstrating some of our latest equipment and procedures for kitty parents! This time we were featuring Acupuncture with Dr. De Bernardis, and Abdominal Ultrasound with Dr. Mustillo. Many of our clients stopped by to visit, and everyone learned a lot. Yummy snacks were served, and we held a raffle for a gift basket filled with cat-related goodies. The raffle raised over $100 for our Aurora’s Angels Fund, which helps us provide care for cats in our community.
Dr. Dale Rubenstein assisted with the development of the certification examination for the Academy of Veterinary Technicians in Clinical Practice. This selective group is essentially a board certification process for veterinary technicians. The ACVTCP mission is to advance the profession of veterinary technology through recognition and support of veterinary technicians and veterinary nurses who demonstrate the highest standards of practice in clinical healthcare. The technicians must pass a rigorous testing process, and demonstrate a high level of knowledge about veterinary medicine. Skilled veterinary nurses and technicans are crucial to providing top quality care. Dr. Rubenstein was excited to be able to assist in this process of advancing our veterinary medical profession!
Despite some very chilly weather on a late April day, Dr. Dale Rubenstein donned coat and gloves to clean up a section of roadway here in Germantown, MD. A Cat Clinic participates in Maryland’s Adopt A Road program to help keep our community a beautiful place to live and work.
2017
Once again, A Cat Clinic hosted our Holiday Cat Food Drive to benefit Animal Welfare League of Montgomery County. This wonderful organization helps many local cats find new forever homes. This year we collected about 400 lbs of food and other cat items–it filled up two cars! If you missed this year’s food drive, you can always donate items directly to Animal Welfare League, or you can bring by the clinic and we can have it picked up from here. Thank you as always for your generosity!
On Friday, November 17 Dr. Rubenstein participated in Kingsview Middle School’s Career Day. She always enjoys working with the students at this age, most of whom love animals, and several are usually thinking about a career in veterinary medicine. She spoke to several classes about the life of a veterinarian and what it takes to become one. If you know of a school or other interested group that would like one of our doctors to speak with them about veterinary medicine, just let us know!
On Thursday, November 16, Dr. De Bernardis spoke to a class of Veterinary Assistant Program students at Montgomery College in Rockville about proper feline handling techniques. The focus was on teaching the students ways to read a cat’s body language, and to handle cats in ways that minimize their fear and stress. Our hope is that more people will start to understand how to handle cats to make veterinary visits as pleasant as possible for cats and their owners, no matter where they go.
Dr. Rubenstein took advantage of a crisp November day this past weekend to do a fall clean-up of our Montgomery County Adopt-A-Road section. She and her husband collected a large bag each of recycling material and trash. Thanks, Dr. R for helping keep our Germantown community beautiful!
Rebecca, a 4th year veterinary student from the University of Florida College of Veterinary Medicine, joined us for a week in July, 2017 to learn more about feline practice. She spent 3 weeks in Maryland and also spent time at two other cat practices in addition to ours. The doctors enjoyed having her here and the opportunity to show her our feline-only practice.
Rebecca said, “I absolutely loved it. I can’t deny how happy it makes me to see so many healthy cats with happy clients. I felt really lucky to have been able to work with so many great veterinarians and technicians!” She also said it was helpful and important to see how medicine is practiced out in “real life” as opposed to at the university, where everything gets a CT scan, an ultrasound, full bloodwork, etc. Although she also has an interest in ophthalmology, she said “The only thing that really surprised me about cat practice was how much I loved it and how many other people share my passion for treating and being around cats”. We wish her all the best in her future veterinary career!
Our Summer R.I.S.E intern, Sehba, is a high school student hoping to pursue a career in science or technology. She had no prior animal experience prior to being placed with our clinic, but loved working with our feline patients! From watching the doctors in the exam rooms to assisting the technicians with patient care, she was able to observe all areas of our practice. She learned a lot about the importance of good communication skills, both for clients and among staff members. Sehba said she would definitely recommend the program to other students as a way to get exposure to an area of interest out in the “real world”. She enjoyed her experience at A Cat Clinic so much that she is now working as a part time veterinary assistant!
Helping foster young animal lovers’ interest in veterinary medicine is something everyone at A Cat Clinic wants to do. This summer, we have two opportunities to do just that.
From July 10-27, we will have two high school students participating in the Summer R.I.S.E (Real Interesting Summer Experience) program here at the clinic. This is a locally funded initiative led by WorkSource Montgomery in collaboration with Montgomery County Public Schools and other partners, that provides MCPS rising juniors and seniors with enriching summer career development experiences. The students will shadow the doctors and staff to learn about our business, especially the importance of customer service and the role of technology in our operation. They also earn a stipend, learn about financial literacy, and participate in both online and in person professionalism training to help prepare them for college and careers.
During the week of July 19-25, we will have a 3rd year veterinary student from the University of Florida shadowing the doctors and learning about our feline practice. Most veterinary students do not have many opportunities to work just with cats, so we hope to give this student an idea of what feline practice is all about.
We are looking forward to meeting these students and sharing with them our love for what we do.
2016
A Cat Clinic has the most generous clients and friends! During our 3rd Annual Holiday Pet Food Drive to benefit the Animal Welfare League of Montgomery County, we collected over 1000 cans and 200 lbs of dry food! We definitely exceeded our goal of collecting more than last year. Thank you to everyone who donated!
It took quite a few trips to the car to load up everything we collected, but from dry food and canned food to a watering fountain and many things in between, everything was greatly appreciated by AWLMC. And certainly the many cats that find forever homes through their organization are grateful to you as well. =^^=
Our 30th Anniversary on Saturday, June 11th was a big success! We had a wonderful turnout and it seemed like a good time was had by all. The staff stood at stations around the clinic to show off our equipment and services, the doctors gave tours of the clinic, and we had delicious goodies and gift bags for all. We raffled off two gift baskets, raising $150 for the Animal Welfare League of Montgomery County and over $200 for Aurora’s Angels Fund. Thanks to all who stopped by and especially for supporting these two very worthy causes!
Dr. Dale Rubenstein spoke to students at Ridgeview Middle School in Gaithersburg for their Career Day on Tuesday, March 15, 2016. She talked to several classes about what it takes to become and live the life of a veterinarian.
2015
A Cat Clinic held our annual Holiday Cat Food Drive here at the clinic. This year we collected over 250 pounds of cat food and accessories! Thanks to all our wonderful clients and friends who generously donated to our food drive.
Any time you have extra unopened bags or cans of food, you may drop them by the clinic and we will pass them along to an organization in need! For more information, contact us at messages@acatclinic.us or 301-540-7770.
Dr. Mustillo gave her presentation on Environmental Enrichment for Cats on Saturday, November 14 here at A Cat Clinic. Thanks to all who attended! Everyone seemed to go home with some useful tips for keeping their cats happily occupied and out of trouble.
A Cat Clinic has set up Aurora’s Angels Fund, a non-profit dedicated to helping our clinic provide veterinary care for cats in need. We think Aurora would be very proud to have her memory honored in this way. Read our blog posts on the fund, “Aurora’s Angels Fund: Help us help cats in need” and “Aurora’s Angels Fund: Thank you!!“, go to our Aurora’s Angels Fund page to learn more, or just go to the Veterinary Care Foundation website to donate.
Dr. Rubenstein participated in Career Day at Daly Elementary School in Germantown on Thursday, April 2, 2015. She read one of her favorite stories, “Dragon’s Fat Cat” to the kindergarten class, and patiently answered questions and listened to the students relate their own animal experiences.
Dr. Dale Rubenstein volunteered to conduct mock interviews with students at Northwest High School in Germantown on Monday, March 23, 2015. The interviews help students evaluate their readiness for the job interview process.
Dr. Mustillo gave an encore presentation of her talk on “Feline Dental Health” on Saturday, February 28, 2015. Despite the weather this February, we were able to hold the seminar and provide useful tips for keeping your kitties’ teeth pearly white and healthy! Thanks to all who attended this talk.
Congratulations, Vicki!
If you have been here in the past two years, you likely met Vicki, one of our technicians. She has a degree in Veterinary Technology and she just became registered in Maryland, so she is now officially an RVT. In order to become registered in Maryland, she had to graduate from an AVMA-approved Veterinary Technology program and pass the Veterinary Technician National Examination.
Congratulations, Vicki! Way to go!
2014
Thank you to all our wonderful clients who donated food for our Holiday Canned Pet Food Drive 2014 to support the Animal Welfare League of Montgomery County. We received over 50 pounds of food as well as some cash donations for local shelter cats! These lucky felines will have a wonderful holiday thanks to your generosity.
Dr. Rubenstein and technician Vicki went to the Hope Center emergency and referral hospital in Rockville on November 16 to give a talk on feline handling techniques to some of their doctors and staff. We know how frightened cats are in a strange environment and we do all we can to help cats feel as safe as possible. The Hope Center staff came away from the talk with many useful tips that we use here every day.
We hope you never require the services of such a referral center, but if you do, it’s nice to know they should be prepared to handle your cat in a way that should minimize stress.
On Saturday, November 15, Dr. Melissa Mustillo gave an encore presentation of “Happy Cats: Environmental Enrichment for Cats” here at A Cat Clinic. She discussed ways to keep your cat happy, whether an “only child” or living with multiple cats.
If you missed this seminar, just let us know if you’d like to attend and she can repeat again next spring. It’s very informative, and everyone seems to leave with new tips and ideas for keeping their feline households happy!
A Cat Clinic doctors and staff participated in the Germantown Oktoberfest on Saturday, October 5. We handed out samples, provided information about feline health, and had a raffle for a gift bag of cat goodies. We saw many familiar faces and got to meet some new friends in the community. It was a nice day and everyone seemed to have a good time!
On Saturday, June 28, Dr. Melissa Mustillo presented “Happy Cats!”, a discussion on environmental enrichment and living in a multi-cat household. The seminar was well attended, and she provided a lot of useful, practical information about keeping your cats occupied and out of trouble.
Stay tuned for information on our next seminar sometime this fall.
Dr. Melissa Mustillo presented a seminar on Feline Dental Health on Saturday, February 8 here at A Cat Clinic. Fortunately the day was snow-free, and fifteen people joined her for discussions on understanding feline oral disease and how to keep your cat’s teeth clean and healthy. All attendees received a gift bag of some dental treats, and one lucky person received a gift basket with a bag of dental diet, a dental toy and a few other goodies for their cat to enjoy.
Watch for more information about another upcoming seminar on an important feline health topic sometime this spring.
2013
Dr. Rubenstein gave a talk for the Animal Welfare League of Montgomery County on Senior Cat Care on Thursday, November 21. She presented important tips for keeping older kitties in tip-top shape. The talk was held at the AWL facility in Gaithersburg.
Dr. Rubenstein was asked to speak on “Women in Careers” at Northwest High School in Germantown on October 7. She was able to provide the students with insight into her own experiences (as well as other women she knows) working as a professional.
Dr. Rubenstein presented a free seminar, “What to Expect When You’re Expecting — A Kitten!” here at A Cat Clinic on Wednesday, July 24th. Topics included nutrition, litter box training, scratching, carriers, introducing to other pets, and other general subjects. Thanks to our friends who joined us for this informative evening to learn more about caring for a new kitten!
If you have a topic you would like us to consider for an upcoming seminar here at the clinic, please let us know! Contact us at messages@acatclinic.us or 301-540-7770.
Dr. Rubenstein presented a free seminar, “From Kittens to Cats”, on Thursday June 6. The seminar was sponsored by the Feline Focus Committee of the Montgomery County Humane Society.
A Cat Clinic hosted an Open House on Saturday, May 4. It was a beautiful day, and many of our friends stopped by to tour the hospital, meet the staff, and learn about how to keep their cats healthy!
Dr. Mustillo demonstrates ultrasound imaging.
Stephanie points out an interesting finding on an x-ray.
Thanks to all who were able to join us!
Dr. Melissa Mustillo was featured in the recent AAHA newsletter, Pets Matter. Click here to read how getting a physical exam could save your kitty’s life!
2012
Dr. Dale Rubenstein spoke on Senior Cat Wellness in November, 2012 at the Animal Welfare League Cat Shelter in Gaithersburg, MD.
Dr. Dale Rubenstein recently spoke at the 6th International Conference on Antimicrobial Agents in Veterinary Medicine.
The doctors enjoy sharing their knowledge with cat lovers of all ages! Please contact the hospital if you would like to arrange a tour or to have one of our doctors come speak to your group.
Dr. Rubenstein reading to classroom