Meet Dr. Sy Woon | Veterinarian & Medical Director

We had the good fortune of connecting with Dr. Sy Woon and we’ve shared our conversation below.

Hi Dr. Sy, can you walk us through the thought-process of starting your business?
I created Angel Wing Vets L.A. because, as a pet parent myself, I think it’s SO important that we can give our beloved pets the most peaceful and meaningful passing, in the comfort of their own homes. Not only are my pet patients surrounded by loved ones in a familiar environment, but they also get to avoid any stress that might be associated with transport or being in a hospital setting. Having worked in a variety of private practices, non-profit animal hospitals, and mobile vet services, it has always been apparent that in-home euthanasia is one of the most compassionate gifts we can give to our pets.

I’ve personally had several experiences that further inspired my work – unfortunately, back in Australia there was no in-home service available for our family dog Nick almost a decade ago, and I still wish he had been given this option. Additionally, one of my cats had to be rushed to the emergency hospital and didn’t have the opportunity to be euthanized at home. So, I truly understand firsthand what a difference this service can provide for both pet parents and their furbabies. Moreover, creating my own company was important to me because I wanted my service to be as personalized as possible, whether it’s offering special treats to enjoy in their final moments (oreos, peanut butter, and special fish paste treats, to name a few!) or making a pawprint momento of each patient for their parents to keep forever, and a special lock of fur in a glass receptacle.

What’s the most difficult decision you’ve ever had to make?

It is hard to define a single most difficult decision I’ve ever made, but there have been several challenging ones I’ve encountered. Moving to Los Angeles, after having created a very secure and stable life in Florida for almost 8 years as a veterinarian, was a difficult decision in terms of everything required to make it happen; practicing as a vet in the state of California requires significantly more hurdles and paperwork than every other state – I almost gave up partway through because it seemed like there was no end in sight. Then, shortly after moving to LA – sacrificing a secure salaried veterinary job in pursuit of creating Angel Wing Vets was a decision that entailed a great deal of risk and relied on using up all of my savings in order to launch. But it was important to me that I create a company that is 100% consistent with my values and beliefs and – as with my decision to move to Los Angeles – I have no regrets!

Finally, and perhaps most significantly, there was my decision to discontinue emergency hospital care for my senior dog (back in 2020) in order to drive him back to my home so that I could euthanize him peacefully there. Milo was not a fan of being inside any vet clinic and, because of his critical condition, there was a very real prospect he would simply continue to languish in the hospital and potentially pass there. Although he was 13 years old and was originally a surrendered senior dog battling Diabetes and other chronic medical conditions, even now I sometimes reflect on this and wonder “what if”, even though I know it was the right decision.

I can be extremely decisive when it comes to informing other pet parents when it is “time” for their furbabies because I’m able to apply an objective, professional veterinary lens; however, it is always challenging when – even as a seasoned vet – you have to decide for your own pet. But, as with any challenge we face in life, these difficult decisions provide us with invaluable insight; it gave me deep empathy for my pet parent clients who are going through this process, and when they are distraught over this decision, both my professional and personal experiences have equipped me to counsel them.

What’s one thing about your industry that outsiders are probably unaware of?

An unfortunate fact about the veterinary industry is the epidemic of mental health struggles that our profession faces, oftentimes unbeknownst to the general public. Veterinarians bear one of the highest suicide rates of all professions, and 1 in 6 veterinary professionals contemplates suicide. Since May is National Mental Health Awareness Month, I am planning to launch the inaugural episode of my podcast, “The Secret Lives of Vets,” at the end of this month. The podcast is intended to be a candid, behind-the-scenes preview into the personal lives of veterinarians. It is both intended to help fellow colleagues feel heard and commiserate, as well as giving the wider public some insight into the issues we deal with, thereby promoting compassion.

When people hear about the aforementioned veterinarian statistic, the common misconception is that this relates to euthanizing pets as part of our work; whereas, studies show that it tends to be more related to negative client interactions that may escalate to bullying, encountering daily ethical dilemmas leading to compassion fatigue, lacking mental health support, and dealing with long working hours that are an expected part of the profession, while juggling financial debt compounded by being underpaid. My job that specifically focuses on euthanasia does entail a significant amount of emotional energy; I am counseling clients through a precarious and extremely sensitive process. However, this responsibility is offset by the rewarding nature of helping pets and their parents. I cannot begin to describe the deep gratitude my clients express for helping to alleviate their pet’s suffering and guiding them through this challenging time. I am truly blessed to have the best clients in Los Angeles!

Risk-taking: how do you think about risk, what role has taking risks played in your life/career?

I think a lot of inertia happens in life because we are scared of making an irreversible mistake if we choose a certain decision – and, any decision that has a potentially unknown outcome may be considered a “risky” one and therefore daunting. But I feel like we can’t learn without making mistakes, and we can’t grow without getting outside of our comfort zone. I would identify myself as somewhat of a risk-taker, especially since I don’t tend to focus on the potential negative consequences and I also tend to trust my intuition over necessarily what might be considered rationality. A lot of people are shocked that I would move to the other side of the planet, all by myself, at the age of 23 years; of course, there are endless potential risks involved, but I didn’t focus on any of those.

Also, I am an eternal optimist even in the face of what may seem an unsalvageable scenario. Where many others would think a situation is a lost cause and would likely give up, I see opportunity! While this doesn’t always result in a successful outcome, more often than not I am lucky enough that it does. I’m often told to be “more realistic,” but I would definitely attribute my unrealistic and optimistic tendencies to achieving seemingly unattainable milestones, such as graduating as a veterinarian – with two degrees under my belt – at 23 years of age, despite having severe, unmedicated and undiagnosed (at the time) ADHD, and despite Science subjects not being my forte. I was born and grew up in Australia and have aspired to be a vet for as long as I can remember! Attaining the marks needed to get into vet school at the University of Sydney was one of my greatest challenges in my life, but I was accepted into vet school at the age of 17 years old because I worked hard and never lost sight of my passion. I hope that inspires others to never give up on their dreams.

My belief in the impossible results in seizing opportunities or making decisions that others would have given up on – I love the comparison image of the two people digging in underground tunnels, and one of them almost reaching the diamond goal but giving up JUST prior to reaching it because they couldn’t see how close they were to the jewel! It’s an apt reminder that we should never give up because we never know how close we truly are to achieving our goal.

Alright, so let’s move onto what keeps you busy professionally?
I moved to Florida right after graduating from the University of Sydney and never anticipated I would end up in LA, even though it couldn’t be more fitting because I love being involved in various media endeavors and moreover, I am a Vegan. Shortly after moving to LA, I founded and became Medical Director for Angel Wing Vets Los Angeles – a home euthanasia service that caters for all of LA county and which I launched in 2023, after having worked full time in the end-of-life space back in Florida. Prior to moving to LA approximately a year and a half ago, I had been living and working in South Florida (Ft Lauderdale/West Palm beach area) as a veterinarian for almost 8 years!

One of the lessons I’ve learned along the way is the incomparable unconditional love that our pets give to us and the strength of this emotional bond – a lot of people assume that my job must be depressing, but in fact the intensive anguish families show in saying goodbye is a testament to the incredible depth of the bond they shared, which is truly touching. A reoccurring life lesson relates to my favorite quote by the Dalai Lama “Sometimes not getting what you want can be a wonderful stroke of luck”. Oftentimes, we might feel immense disappointment because we didn’t achieve an expected or desired outcome in life. But just like another favorite quote “Rejection is Redirection”, I truly believe that any negative situations we might endure help to impart the most meaningful lessons, and often leads us on a different and better pathway.

I’m proud of having moved across the other side of the world from my home country of Australia and creating my own independent life in America. Despite my career being in veterinary medicine – the scientific field – I am inherently a more artistically-inclined individual, which makes me somewhat of an anomaly amongst my veterinary colleagues. I often yearn for more hours in the day to be able to pursue some of these artistic interests, such as pastel painting and sketching, and I used to play the violin and piano for many years.

Although on the face of it Angel Wing Vets LA may not seem necessarily an artistic endeavor in any way, I do find ways to incorporate creative elements; for instance, I loved helping to design my logo for the business (there were too many revisions to count, before I was finally satisfied with the final product!) and I also designed every aspect of the website myself, which was a steep learning curve and required a lot of creative input and continues to be an on-going project. I am forever trying to think of creative ways to make memorial items for pet parents, such as the personalized corked glass receptacle to keep a lock of fur, a special Remembrance certificate, and making a molded clay pawprint of their pet to keep forever.

Other ways I’m able to indulge in creative avenues within my personal life include being commissioned by veterinary/pet companies to produce educational vet videos, as well as envisioning the development of “The Secret Lives of Vets” podcast which I plan to launch this month, occasionally partaking in standup comedy at open mic events (as you can imagine, being an Asian Female Vegan Veterinarian lends itself to a wealth of potential material!), and being currently in contract negotiations with a production company that accepted my pitch deck to create a reality show focused on rescuing senior dogs. I am also planning to create a Youtube channel for kids, called “Dr. Sy’s Animal Adventures” where I get to teach kids aged 2 – 6 years all about animals! Ultimately, my goal is to be invited onto Sesame Street as their resident Veterinarian, because I would love to be the doctor who gets to see Big Bird or Elmo for their important vet appointments!

In my spare time, I am a vocal advocate for a variety of animal welfare issues, and have participated in legislative lobbying in Washington DC, Tallahassee and Sacramento. I was proud to have been the veterinarian face for the campaign to end greyhound racing in the state of Florida – we were successful in passing the ban to outlaw greyhound racing by 2020. My greatest passion in life is encouraging others, especially children, to have compassion for all animals and to fight for their protection.

I was lucky enough to have a very loving family support system in my parents and older brother, and I want all children to know that they are loved and that they can pursue any dream they have if they work hard. I want to foster compassion for animals in children by leading through my own actions of helping animals. And, of course, I want to continue to provide the utmost compassionate and loving goodbye for our pets with my home service.

My Professional Bio:

Sy Woon, BVSc BSc(Vet)(Hons)
HSVMA CALIFORNIA STATE CO-REPRESENTATIVE
Dr. Sy Woon originates from Australia where she grew up in Canberra and graduated from the University of Sydney’s veterinary school. Since moving to the United States in 2015, she has worked extensively in private practice as well as at non-profit hospitals and rescues. During this time, she was appointed Medical Director at both Justin Bartlett Animal Hospital and Good Karma Pet Rescue of South Florida. She also worked with Lap of Love Veterinary Hospice, providing mobile in-home euthanasia and hospice care, and is currently undertaking her Veterinary Acupuncture certification with Chi University., In 2022, she moved to Los Angeles to launch the LA branch of a mobile vet company and subsequently founded her own house-call euthanasia service, Angel Wing Vets Los Angeles. For the prior seven years, she has been the HSVMA Florida State Co-Representative which involved advocating for and lobbying on animal welfare issues such as puppy mills and declawing, as well as being actively involved in legislative reforms such as the successful ban on greyhound racing in Florida. Having moved to LA, Dr. Woon has continued her position with HSVMA as a California State Co-Representative, which has also entailed legislative lobbying efforts.

During vet school, Dr. Woon served as President of the University of Sydney Animal Welfare Society for three years and was heavily involved in campaigning on various animal rights/welfare issues within her university, the local community and nationwide. She founded the Sydney University Vets Beyond Borders Student Chapter and was selected as a representative on her university’s Animal Welfare Advisory Committee. Dr. Woon worked as Project Officer and Volunteer Coordinator for Medical Advances Without Animals (MAWA) Trust for several years, and was involved with Sentient, The Veterinary Institute for Animal Ethics as Student Coordinator, and then Committee Member. She wrote a project proposal for Sentient that was awarded a grant from Voiceless The Animal Protection Institute to fund the development of an annual essay contest for veterinary students encouraging critical research into animals exploited in agriculture, entertainment and laboratories.

Dr. Woon has spoken at multiple stateside and international conferences on animal welfare and ethics, and last year was invited by Global Talent Partners (one of the largest veterinary recruitment agencies) to create and present a lecture series for vet students. She was awarded a Davis Projects for Peace grant to carry out a rabies prevention and education campaign in India that she independently designed; she presented her research on humane veterinary education as an invited speaker at the 8th World Congress on Alternatives and Animal Use in the Life Sciences in Montreal; and her op-eds on social issues and her humane veterinary education research have been published in newspapers and journals, including the Sun Sentinel and ALTEX, in addition to being invited by top US political platform, The Hill, to publish an op-ed on heat stress in pets.
Dr. Woon’s viral pet education videos on Tiktok have garnered millions of plays and reactions, and she has been commissioned by pet wellness brands to produce pet education video content. Most recently, Dr. Woon is collaborating with Petszel (revolutionary post-adoption digital platform for pet parents) to create a series of veterinary educational videos. Dr. Woon also aspires to develop an educational channel for young children, with the aim of fostering their innate compassion for animals, and she is currently in contract negotiations with a Los Angeles-based production company to produce and star in a reality show focused on senior rescue dogs. Dr. Woon has been invited as a veterinary guest to radio shows, including NPR’s ‘All Things Considered’, Talking Animals on WNMF (88.5 FM), and podcasts such as ‘Humane Voices.’ She has also been interviewed for media reports such as ABC’s WPBF 25 News, Fox News, WESH2 News as well as being featured as a veterinary expert on news stations including NBC and CBS News.
In an effort to destigmatize the mental health crisis being faced in the often private veterinary world, Dr. Woon envisioned her podcast, “The Secret Lives of Vets” which will be launching this year. Veterinarians and vet techs bear one of the highest suicide rates of all the professions and continue to face issues such as veterinary shortages which compound existing stressors. By opening up these candid personal discussions with vets themselves, and exploring these factors alongside psychology expert guests, Dr. Woon endeavors to shed light on the mental health struggles pervading her profession and encourage solutions.

If you had a friend visiting you, what are some of the local spots you’d want to take them around to?
Sightseeing: Getty Museum
Getty Villa
Hiking up to the Hollywood sign
Walking along Abbot Kinney
Rollerblading/cycling along Santa Monica beach during sunset
Universal Studios for the day
Lakers game
Dodger’s game with dugout club tickets
Santa Monica Farmer’s Market
Brentwood Farmer’s Market
Enjoying beach time down in Manhattan beach and strolling by the cafes there
Hot yoga class at Kinship in Highland Park, then enjoying the cute cafes across the road

Eating:
Dinner and/or Brunch at Sun Cafe in Studio City
Dinner at H.O.P.E. Healthy Organic Positive Eating restaurant
Dinner or Brunch Planta – in Marina Del Ray
Brunch at Gracias Madre in Weho after partying there the prior night
Coffee break + Vegan Victory Pumpkin Pie at Urth Caffe (Santa Monica) and Vegan Thai afterwards across the road
Dinner at Crossroads Kitchen in Weho
Brunch at Butcher’s Daughter in Venice
Dinner at Annapurna Cuisine in Culver City
Breakfast or Lunch at Joi Cafe in Westlake Village

Shoutout is all about shouting out others who you feel deserve additional recognition and exposure. Who would you like to shoutout?
My endlessly loving parents and brother have forever been supportive of my aspirations and have always encouraged me to pursue my passions! I’m truly grateful for each of them playing an important role in my life and I wouldn’t be where I am without their unconditional presence in my life. My amazing boyfriend is also a source of immense love and support, as well as every pet I’ve fostered or adopted who have inspired me to be the best veterinarian I can be. And, last but not least, my beautiful girl Jewel whom I am lucky enough to have rescued a mere few months after moving to America, and who has been the biggest source of unconditional love, patience and support through all of life’s challenges, as well as being my sole roadtrip buddy when I drove from Fort Lauderdale to Santa Monica where I reside.

Website: www.angelwingvets.com

Instagram: @angelwingvets.losangeles, @thesecretlivesofvets

Linkedin: www.linkedin.com/in/dr-sy-woon

Facebook: bit.ly/4dLElpr