Looking for a cruisy holiday? You’re in the wrong place
Volunteering at WECare isn’t one of those cookie cutter charity placements where you pay loads of money to twiddle your thumbs and feel like a spare part. Our volunteers are vital cogs in the machine. That’s why we only want energetic and driven humans to come join the team. Don’t worry, there’ll plenty of time to surf, swim and laze in the sun with your new BFFs, but you’ve got to be prepared to get your hands dirty – and not mind having a sweaty upper lip…!
I'm not a vet - can I still volunteer?
Yes! It’s not just veterinary volunteers we’re after – if you’ve got a skill, we can probably use it! Whether you’re a tradie, photographer or talented artist, we’d love to hear from you. We’ve always got projects on the go. None of the above, but a world class dog cuddler? We’re always looking for animal care volunteers to spend their days socialising with poorly dogs, cleaning kennels and picking up poo!
Get involved - don't just exist, live!
WE’RE CURRENTLY LOOKING FOR:
Vets (3+ years experience)
Veterinary nurses (2+ years experience)
Animal care assistants
Photographers/videographers
Handymen/women
We prefer long-term volunteers (6+ months for vets/vet nurses and 3+ months for all other volunteers) as it takes a while to get the hang of things – the longer the better!
Please note we can’t accommodate volunteers who only want to do a day or two.
COVID-19 UPDATE
Sri Lanka is slowly opening up to visitors again (yay!), but the rules are changing all the time.
We’re concentrating on hiring permanent staff for our core team, but we’re still happy to hear from people looking to volunteer long-term (6+ months for vets/vet nurses and 3+ months for all other vollies), once this all settles.
Feel free to speculatively apply with intended dates of future travel, as it can take time to get through applications. We look forward to hearing from you!
Why volunteer with WECare?
Do you even need to ask?! You get to work with like-minded humans, go to sleep every night knowing you've made a real difference, and travel around the island in your free time.
Sri Lanka has so much to offer, for such a small country. On your days off, you can surf fun breaks, explore the Cultural Triangle, eat incredible food, chill on stunning beaches, and go on wildlife-filled rainforest adventures.
Unfortunately, thanks to Covid, we no longer have a volunteer house so we we cannot provide accommodation for volunteers. However, we can advise on alternative accommodation in the area (which will be at your own expense). Thank you for understanding.
The application process
Fill in the application form below.
Wait to hear back from our volunteer coordinator.
If we want to move ahead with your application, we’ll arrange a face-to-face/Skype call.
If successful, you’d better get on Skyscanner!
We get a high volume of volunteer applications and it can take a while to process them all. Please sit tight – everyone who applies will receive a response eventually.
Ready to embark on a life-changing adventure?
Before you apply we require all our volunteers to fundraise at least £350 prior to arrival which will go towards our hospital running costs.
![This week’s #TransformationTuesday is a DRAMATIC one – if you love the drama, get a cuppa and settle in, baby. Ya ready?? ☕
Love is a ~2 year old street cat from Dikwella who was brought in on 4th July by her guardians when she started having difficulty breathing after eating some fish the day before, so we suspected she had a bone stuck 🐟😲
On arrival, Love was really struggling to breathe, so we gave her oxygen before doing chest X-rays, where nothing abnormal was found. She coughed up rice and a fish bone when we examined her mouth, but we couldn’t find any further foreign bodies. Laryngoscope examination showed inflamed laryngeal folds so we think the fish bones/s had been sat there irritating/piercing the larynx (the folds at the top of the windpipe which stop food going down when you swallow) for 24 hours, causing them to swell up, blocking the windpipe. Unfortunately, despite one bone being out, the damage was done at this point 😬
And then…Love then tried to die on us. We brought her back to life with chest compressions and intubated her to help her breathe. Then Love’s heart rate then dropped from 100 to 60, she developed a gallop and her breathing was very shallow, so @janeythevet opted to place an emergency tracheostomy tube (one that’s placed via the neck straight into the windpipe), which we had to improvise as we don’t have all the fancy bits we usually have at home...! 😮 (Janey even said this was probably the most hectic on-the-spot emergency she’s dealt with in her career…! “We knew we were losing her and had to quickly do it. I really thought we were going to lose her!”)
Thankfully we didn’t lose her and Love improved almost immediately, but took almost 2.5 hours to recover properly before getting up and about. Nurses Pia and Jo took Love to their house for overnight care, as the tube needs regular cleaning and suctioning, to get rid of any mucus that may be blocking it. As our tube was improvised, it needed checking more often than usual, so the nurses were getting up every hour to check on her 😴
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