If you live in the Middleburg area and sport a set of whiskers and a tail, you probably know Jack and Janet. They are the kind people that make you feel better, and you are ever so grateful to wag your tail goodbye. Chances are you've known them all your life; it's even likely they were the ones who stayed up all night helping you and your littermates into this world. Your owner knows them as Dr. Jack Love and Dr. Janet McKim of the Middleburg Animal Hospital, who for 20 years have been here to heal and care for our families' pets.

Jack and Janet met while attending Ohio State Veterinary School; they graduated in 1980, and married soon afterwards. Janet's best friend happened to be living in the DC area, and after several visits, they knew this would be the place to live. They started working in the McLean area, and soon after establishing themselves began looking in 1984 for a permanent place for their practice.

That's how they found Middleburg. An existing veterinarian practice was for sale here that included both a veterinary facility and property. Best of all, as Janet put it, "We could afford it!"

Janet was pregnant with their first child when they bought the property in September, 1984, and Jack says he's always felt that there must have been some special fate involved in their finding such a special community and opportunity at that time in their lives.

They had just enough time to move in and start work; their son was born in November, 1984. From the start they were busy, seven days a week, and handling emergencies, too, because at that time there wasn't an emergency animal hospital in the entire county.

Janet, in fact, returned to work only 10 days after her son was born. "I just brought the baby to work; there wasn't much down time in those years," she said.

Two years later Jack and Janet had their second child, and she came to work, too. As Jack said "We would trade them off in the waiting room, let clients hold the baby while we took the animals; of course, this only worked until our children got feet, then we had to find child care."

Jack and Janet's veterinary practice now focuses on small animals, dogs and cats, and – at times – wildlife, including deer, birds and the occasional turtle with a cracked shell. (Janet glues them back together.) Love and McKim love animals. "Our policy is to do as much as we can to help any animal in need . . . animals owned by those who really can't afford to take care of them ... and animals that, sadly, don't have homes at all," says Janet. "I think in 20 years we probably have never put an animal down if there was any way at all that we could help it."

Excerpts from our interview:

How have you managed working 24/7 all these years?

Jack: In 1995, Janet was instrumental in starting the animal emergency hospital in Leesburg. This has been a huge relief. Part of the personality of veterinarians is that you want to take care of everything; it was a little hard to give up, but then it was hard on us to do it all the time. So it did give us a life at a time when our kids were getting into things and we could be there for them.

Janet: Also, there is a better quality of [emergency] care there, they have board certified people in emergency medicine, which is almost unheard of outside of a university; the emergency hospital is really excellent.

Do either of you have special projects that you are committed to?

Janet: We are both working towards a specialty; Jack is going to get certified in 'Ultrasonography' (the application of ultrasound technology for non-invasive internal viewing).

Jack: I just got named to the Board of Directors of the International Veterinary Ultrasound Society, and Janet has recently been certified in Chinese herbal medicine.

Janet: I've been certified in veterinary acupuncture for 12 years and in Chinese herbs for about 2 years. The Chinese have been practicing these skills for 5,000 years on people, but also they have charts for working on chickens, horses, pigs, but it was the western people that developed the charts for cats and dogs. It is interesting, now that China is starting to have dogs and cats as pets, there is bartering going on – for us trading our charts and knowledge for information from them. Veterinary acupuncture is amazing, how well it works when nothing else will.

Can you give me an example?

Janet: The dogs most prone to back problems are Dachshunds, or Corgis, because of their long backs. I've had 2 Dachshunds who were paralyzed and beyond surgery who are now walking because of acupuncture, and they do not have to be treated anymore. The first was about 10 years ago, the second was 3 years ago, and they are both still out on the road today. So sometimes it is really impressive, and other times it is just one more thing you can do. I blend western with eastern; I don't treat just with eastern, but with the exception of backs, I'll only use acupuncture. They have done western studies on acupuncture, and there are 150 things we can measure through blood tests or electrically that you can modify through acupuncture points. You can raise a white blood cell count, or lower a white blood cell count with acupuncture points, so we are proving from a scientific realm why it works.

Tell us how the Chinese herbs play a role in what you do.

Janet: I look at herbs as more like internal medicine, so I use those for a lot of chronic case. To put it into western terms they have a lot of antiviral, and antibacterial herbs, and in western medicine we are pretty limited with what we can do for viruses. I can actually do more with eastern medicine with viruses than western medicine.

Jack: Janet mentioned that acupuncture has something else to offer us, which is sort of one of our philosophies. We don't want to say (unless there is nothing else we can do) that there is nothing left for us to do; we like to give options. We do a lot of research; we also use the Internet using a veterinarian network we subscribe to, and we look in books, and call specialists. We just don't say – if we don't know – "that is all there is". We want to give our patients a worthy advocate board, and the best chance we can.

How do you integrate the ultrasound into your practice?

Jack: It's been incredible. Ultrasound was being widely used when I got into it about three years ago; in fact, we were using it so much that the doctor who was coming here to do it, we couldn't get him here enough. We use it a lot on urinary problems, on hearts to detect heart disease. You can pick up on things before they become a real problem and start the patient on preventive medicines. Also for abdominal masses, if I feel something in the abdomen, we can ultrasound it, and get an idea what it is hooked to. It is extremely helpful in picking up things that we would have missed otherwise, so it is a great tool.

Have you ever had people bring you aquatic creatures to heal?

Jack: We do not do aquatics.

Janet: Except for Oscar! Mr. Harmon, who owns the video store, has Oscars. They are big fish, and are really interesting because they really do interact with you, they don't just swim around. They would respond to him: he would touch them, and they appeared to enjoy it. They are almost like cats in the water. So when his Oscar got sick, because I don't know anything about aquatic medicine, what we ended up doing was calling the Baltimore Aquarium for guidance. We don't do this on a routine basis, but we talked to them and put Oscar on a type of antibiotic, and he recovered.

I guess you two do go the extra mile. What do you like about having your practice here?

Jack: The community has been great to us. The neat thing about being in a small and stable community is that we see families and their kids grow up, all the way to college. We also see the full life track of their animals. It is nice to be there at the beginning of an animal's life, but it is also important to be there at the end too.

Janet: It is a very personal thing, so we will come to our clients' homes. It is more of a comfortable place, with family and friends around. It is just what one should do for an old friend.

The Middleburg Animal Hospital's motto is "Gentle words, capable hands, caring hearts." The vets both have proved this true and a great deal more. Happy twentieth anniversary, Jack and Janet, and may there be many more!