Introduction

Welcome to the VeNom Coding Group, the group that has developed and maintains a standard set of clinical veterinary terms, the VeNom Codes for use in referral veterinary hospital electronic patient records and first opinion veterinary practice management systems.

The Aims of the VeNom Coding Group are:

  1. To promote clinical data coding within veterinary medicine in general. 
  2. To encourage and facilitate the use of the VeNom Codes across veterinary institutions, practices and other elements of the veterinary industry.

The VeNom Codes have been developed in the first opinion and referral hospitals through collaboration between the Royal Veterinary College (RVC), University of Glasgow School of Veterinary Medicine (UGSVM) and the PDSA. The codes are a list of terms that are used in veterinary practice and have been standardised across institutes to facilitate academic discussion, research and clinical auditing. Currently, the codes consist of diagnoses, presenting complaints, procedures, diagnostic tests, reason for visit and administrative tasks associated with companion animal veterinary work (small animal and equine). Species and breed (dog, cat and rabbit) lists have been released and equine breeds will be released shortly.  Both general practice and referral practice terminologies are included.

Access to the codes

Codes last updated: January 2024

The VeNom codes are provided as a free open access resource subject to end-users agreeing to adopt the rules of the VeNom Coding Group, namely that the VeNom Coding Group maintains the terms and all amendments to them. If, for example, an end-user requests a new term, the request is forwarded to the VeNom Coding Group, the term is considered by the VeNom Scientific Forum and the term is adopted if considered appropriate. New editions of the VeNom Codes are released on a quarterly basis and forwarded to all registered end-users.