Veterinary Technician

Universityhealthnetwork; Toronto; On-site; CAD 60,000 - 75,000; Full time

Job summary

University Health Network (UHN) is seeking an experienced Veterinary Technician for the Animal Resource Centre. The role involves colony management, animal husbandry, health monitoring and providing technical services such as blood draws and drug administration.

You will collaborate with veterinarians and laboratory staff, ensure SOP compliance, and maintain accurate records of treatments and housing conditions across multi-species animal facilities at multiple sites in Toronto.

Qualifications

• Completion of a community college program in Veterinary Technology or recognized equivalent.
• Registration with Canadian Association for Laboratory Animal Science as a Registered Laboratory Animal Technician, may be obtained after employment.
• Minimum one year practical and related experience and/or 2 years on-the-job training.
• Previous experience within a laboratory animal facility.
• Previous experience working with large animals in a research setting.
• Experience handling laboratory animals; both rodents and larger animal species.
• WHMIS training.
• Ability to utilize Excel, Word and Outlook at moderate proficiency.
• Ability to lift 50 lbs.

Responsibilities

• Perform colony management and animal husbandry for multi-species laboratory animals.
• Provide health monitoring, treatments and technical services such as blood draws and drug administration.
• Communicate with clinical veterinarians and lab staff regarding animal health and welfare.
• Maintain room cleanliness and equipment and ensure SOP adherence.
• Prepare tissue samples and perform basic QA as directed.

Skills

Animal care

Animal husbandry

Communication

Teamwork

Excel

Education

Veterinary Technology program

Registration with CALAS as LAT

Tools

Excel

Word

Outlook

Job description

Union: Non-Union

Number of Vacancies: 1

Replacement or New: Replacement

Site: Multi-site ( Toronto General Hospital, Toronto Western Hospital, PMCRT, Max Bell)

Department: Animal Resource Centre

Reports to: Manager

Wages: $31.02 - $38.78 per hour

Hours: 37 . 5 hours/week

Shifts: Saturday-Wednesday 7 am - 3 pm

Status: Permanent Full Time

Closing Date: September 23, 2026

Position Summary

University Health Network (UHN) is looking for an experienced professional to fill the key role of Veterinary Technician in our Animal Resource Centre. Veterinary Technicians, within UHN's Animal Resource Centre, are involved in basic animal husbandry of multi species of laboratory animals and are responsible for the health and welfare of animals in their care. Duties include colony management, animal husbandry of a variety of species(large and small species), health monitoring, treatments and technical services such as blood draws, gavage and drug administration.

Veterinary Technicians are involved in day-to-day communication with clinical veterinarians and laboratory staff, contacting them by phone and or email with any issues involving animal health and welfare.

Duties

• Performing feeding, watering, cage changing as per ARC Standard Operating Procedure (SOP) appropriate for the species, as needed
• Ensuring appropriate environmental enrichment (EE) for the species is offered as per ARC SOP
• Taking care of special research models as per protocol e.g., immune deficient mice
• Taking care of large animal species as per protocol
• Caring for, cleaning and general maintenance of assigned animal housing rooms and associated equipment
• Taking care of animals with Biohazard areas following proper SOP, personal protective equipment (PPE) and decontamination procedures for PPE, equipment and waste leaving the containment area
• Maintains responsibility for animal health/welfare for animals assigned to care; conducting daily visual inspections and observations on food and water intake, cage conditions, alerting on call veterinarian to health issues and submitting sick cases
• Carrying out veterinary instructions given either by written (sick case) or verbal instructions, including administering drugs
• Updating sick cases and treatment sheets as required
• Notifying lab groups of issues concerning their animals verbally or by email
• Performing necropsy or tissue collection e.g., ecto/endo parasite check, microbiological samples taken, blood and/or serum samples, tissue for histology as needed
• Performing tissue sampling and post mortems, as directed by the attending veterinarian
• Ensuring room and facility conditions are adequate as per provincial legislation (Ontario Ministry of Food, Agriculture and Rural Affairs) and federal guidelines (Canadian Council on Animal Care) for animal holding areas, record keeping environmental conditions; temperature, humidity, light, ammonia levels
• Alerting Supervisor and/or Physical Plant Staff of any issues regarding environmental conditions
• Carrying out QA measures as directed by Supervisor or Manager, including: pH reading and recording, using air settle plates, fomite swabs for room and equipment microbiological monitoring
• Overseeing responsibilities on QA being carried out in the dirty and clean cage wash up areas by Animal Care personnel, as required
• Packaging tissue and biological samples appropriately for shipment to various testing facilities, as required
• Carrying out technical services on a fee for service basis for laboratory staff on a variety of laboratory animal species, as required, including: breeding colony maintenance, identification, DNA sampling, drug dosing, blood or tissue sampling, injections, gavage etc.
• Administration of drug or treatment as directed by on call veterinarian
• Maintaining record keeping for breeding colonies
• Maintaining record keeping for technical services for billing and invoicing
• Cage inventory and/or animals, on daily/weekly basis as part of the invoicing to investigators
• Inputting of inventory data to spreadsheets eg. colony census or as part of a breeding program
• Ensuring valid animal use protocol numbers are on cage cards and outside animal holding rooms as part of the provincial legislation and federal guidelines pertaining to housing and use of research animals
• Other administrative duties as assigned by the Supervisor or Manager

Requirements

• Completion of a community college program in Veterinary Technology or recognized equivalent
• Registration with Canadian Association for Laboratory Animal Science as a Registered Laboratory Animal Technician, may be obtained after employment
• Minimum one year practical and related experience and/or 2 years on-the-job training required
• Previous experience within a laboratory animal facility
• Previous experience working with large animals in a research setting
• Experience handling laboratory animals; both rodents and larger animal species
• WHMIS training
• Ability to utilize Excel, Word and Outlook at moderate proficiency
• Ability to lift 50 lbs