How to support your veterinary team over the holiday weekend — without letting care slip

For most people, Memorial Day is a chance to unplug. For veterinary clinics, it’s often the opposite.

Instead of downtime, long weekends can mean packed schedules, emergency visits, and long hours. As summer kicks off, clinics see more travel-related appointments, more outdoor injuries, and more last-minute calls from worried pet owners.

The challenge is handling the surge without exhausting your team or compromising care. Here's how to prepare your clinic for the holiday weekend in a way that protects both quality and wellbeing.

Get ahead of the holiday spike

Holiday weekends tend to follow predictable patterns, and the more you can anticipate them, the smoother things will run.

Think about the uptick in visits you typically see around Memorial Day:

Travel health certificates for pets crossing state or national borders
Boarding prep, like wellness checks and vaccine updates
Urgent care for outdoor injuries, heatstroke, or parasite exposure
Preventive care, as flea, tick, and heartworm season ramps up

Instead of guessing, take a look at your appointment data from last year. When did demand start building? What visit types spiked? Were certain days especially busy?

Use those patterns to plan ahead:

Block off time for high-demand services
Adjust staffing to match peak periods
Prioritize urgent or time-sensitive appointments

It’s a small step that makes a big difference. When you know what’s coming, you can stay ahead of the rush — and help your team avoid burnout before it starts.

Set a clear, realistic holiday schedule

Long weekends can put clinics in a tough spot: balancing client expectations with the need to give your team a breather.

Decide early on:

Will you close for the full holiday?
Shorten hours?
Offer urgent care only?

Whatever you choose, make it crystal clear well in advance. Post updates on email, voicemail, and social media. The sooner clients know your plans, the better they can prepare — and the fewer frantic calls you’ll field last-minute.

Early communication also helps reroute non-urgent needs to quieter times, so your staff isn’t stuck handling routine cases in the middle of a packed schedule. A realistic, well-communicated plan protects both your team’s time and your clinic’s capacity.

Define clear roles and backups

When the clinic gets busy, vague assumptions about who is handling what can cause real problems. Clear coverage plans are essential for high-stress days.

Start by mapping out:

Who’s responsible for triaging incoming cases?
Who finalizes charts before the end of the day?
Who handles client follow-ups, like medication instructions or discharge calls?
Who’s designated as backup if someone has to leave unexpectedly?

Even better: create a simple, visible holiday protocol that spells it out. A one-page checklist at the front desk and in treatment areas can help everyone stay on the same page during the busiest moments.

When roles are clear — and backups are built in — the whole team can move faster and more confidently, even under pressure.

Lighten the load with smarter workflows

High-volume days are the worst time for slow, manual processes.

Anything that saves time and reduces repetition gives your team more breathing room—and more focus for patient care.

Look for ways to streamline:

Use templates for common communications like discharge instructions and medication summaries
Create checklists for boarding vaccines, travel paperwork, and emergency triage
Pre-fill forms and documents wherever possible to minimize back-and-forth

And where it makes sense, bring in tech that removes the burden altogether.

AI-powered tools like Happydoc can handle medical documentation in real time, so providers don’t have to stay late finishing charts or risk forgetting key details. Instead of playing catch-up after a long day, teams can maintain structured, complete records without the need for after-hours work.

Every saved minute adds up, especially when the schedule is full and the team is stretched.

Make time for team wellness

Even with great planning, holiday weekends can take a toll.

Staffing is often tighter. Emotions can run high. And working while everyone else seems to be off can feel isolating. That’s why wellness needs to be part of your holiday plan, not an afterthought.

You don’t need anything elaborate. Small gestures go a long way:

Make space for real breaks, even short ones
Hold short team huddles at the start and midpoint of the day
Bring in lunch or snacks to boost morale
Let people leave early when volume allows—even 30 minutes makes a difference
Give verbal shout-outs, thank-you notes, or small rewards for hard work

What matters most is that your team feels seen and supported. When people know leadership is in their corner, they’re more likely to rise to the challenge, without running on empty.

With the right prep, you can handle the surge and give your team space to breathe. Your clients will feel the difference. Your team will remember it. And your clinic will be stronger for it.

Transform your practice with HappyDoc

HappyDoc helps you transform your entire approach to patient care. Your clinic's staff will have a personalized AI scribe that listens, takes notes, integrates with your software, and files the data away in the appropriate spot. HappyDoc works alongside you so you can be free to focus on what matters—your patients.

‍Schedule a demo to find out how your clinic can operate at its full potential, providing the highest level of care to every patient, every time.