2026 Conference Programme

Rebecca joined the Scottish Government as a veterinary adviser in 2017, where she focuses on bovine tuberculosis, zoonotic disease and antimicrobial resistance. Prior to that, she worked for the Animal and Plant Health Agency for nine years in various veterinary roles, including field veterinary officer and international trade veterinary adviser.

Alastair is a consultant veterinary surgeon for Synergy Farm Health Ltd and Scientific Director of Surefarm Ltd. He is an RCVS specialist in cattle health and production.

Caroline has worked for the Animal and Plant Health Agency (APHA) since 2017, initially joining as a Senior Veterinary Inspector (SVI) based in Exeter, before relocating to Scotland and transferring to the Perth office. Since April 2021, she has been a Veterinary Advisor in the Veterinary Exotic Notifiable Diseases Unit (VENDU) within APHA, providing veterinary advice to field vets, policymakers and stakeholders on exotic notifiable disease. In this role, she is the lead vet for vesicular diseases and brucellosis. Caroline has been heavily involved in notifiable disease outbreaks, both as an SVI and within VENDU, including the 2021–2024 HPAI outbreak and recent bluetongue incursion. Prior to joining APHA, Caroline worked predominantly in mixed and farm animal practice in Devon.

Ivelina Miteva is a bovine tuberculosis (bTB) veterinary adviser at the Animal and Plant Health Agency. She holds a veterinary degree from Trakia University, Bulgaria. After working in the UK’s national bTB diagnostic laboratory, she moved into a field‑based veterinary role, where she spent several years investigating and managing complex bTB incidents and producing county‑level annual bTB epidemiology reports.

Her growing interest in the pathophysiology and immunopathology of Mycobacterium bovis led her to complete an MSc in Clinical Microbiology at the University of Nottingham. Her MSc research, conducted in collaboration with the TB Research Group at APHA Weybridge, focused on potential subunit bTB vaccine candidates.

She currently divides her time between acting as Lead Investigator for Phase 3 of the Cattle Vaccine Field Trials and advising on the development and implementation of GB deployment policy for the use of BCG alongside a novel DIVA skin test reagent, pending marketing authorisation for both.

Maria Dominguez qualified in Veterinary Medicine from the University of Zaragoza, Spain, in 1995. After a short period in small animal practice in Spain, she moved to the UK to work in abattoirs for the Meat Hygiene Service and joined the Ministry of Agriculture, Fisheries and Food (MAFF) in 2000 as a Temporary Veterinary Inspector. She has worked for the Animal and Plant Health Agency and its predecessor organisations since then, serving as a Veterinary Officer until 2022 and in various Veterinary Adviser roles thereafter. She has a special interest in bovine tuberculosis, including disease affecting other species, and is currently the Lead Investigator for the Cattle Vaccine Field Trials supporting Marketing Authorisation Application for the TB vaccine and companion DIVA test.

Laura qualified from the University of Edinburgh in 2004 and has spent much of the past 22 years working in government veterinary roles for APHA. For most of that time, she served as a field vet within the Devon field team, primarily managing on‑farm TB cases alongside additional responsibilities in areas such as welfare, PRIMO, and ABP.

In 2014, Laura completed a Master’s in Veterinary Public Health at the University of Glasgow. She then spent three years as a Veterinary Investigation Officer (VIO) at the Starcross Veterinary Investigation Centre.

In 2022, Laura moved to the national Field Epidemiology team, where she now works as a Veterinary Advisor on TB, with a particular focus on WGS and its implementation in field operations.

Simon King is a Claims Consultant for the Veterinary Defence Society (VDS).

Ian is a practising veterinary surgeon and co-owner of the Mount Veterinary Practice in Fleetwood. He has a master’s degree in Veterinary Parasitology, and is Chair of the European Scientific Counsel of Companion Animal Parasites (ESCCAP). Ian has over 130 published peer reviewed articles and papers, and is an editorial board member for the Companion Animal journal. He continues to carry out research in practice, including work on intestinal nematodes and ticks.

After graduating with a Master’s Degree in Public Health and Animal Welfare from the University of Bucharest in 2013, Ioana started her career in veterinary medicine. Dedicated to animal welfare, she worked as a veterinary surgeon in a poultry farm in Romania before moving to the Sultanate of Oman and taking a voluntary position at a veterinary practice with an animal rescue charity.

Looking for a change in career, she then made the decision to come to the UK and work in public health. After successfully completing the Official Veterinarian course in Glasgow, Ioana began her career as an OV. Working in abattoirs in the north of England, Ioana demonstrated excellent skills and strong ambition which did not go unrecognised by her peers. Eager to develop her existing skills and industry knowledge, Ioana joined the team of export certification vets, focusing on exports to China and the USA.

Dedicated to bettering her skills, Ioana was promoted first to the role of Area Resource Manager (ARM), then to the role of Area Veterinary Manager (AVM) and later to Business Development Manager. The implementation of Brexit found Ioana stepping into the position of Acting Head of Exports. For the first two years post-Brexit she was responsible for the successful development of new processes, implementation of EU SPS requirements and delivery of certification across England, Scotland and Wales.

Ioana thoroughly enjoys playing such a key role in veterinary public health, safeguarding the welfare of millions of animals, ensuring food is safe to eat and enabling international trade to continue unfettered.

Roger qualified from the RVC in 1987 and has since worked in the West Country in mixed (mainly farm) practice; most recently at North Park Veterinary Group in West Devon.

He first became involved in export certification work around 2017, when a partner retired and he took over the export of cheese from a local creamery going to third countries. More experience was then gained when the practice started certifying a significant amount of dairy formula powder out of a local transport depot.

However, Brexit resulted in a massive increase in the workload, and gradually extra administration and management ideas were developed to cope with the daily complexities involved in ensuring that CSOs and OVs were at the right depots on the correct days and on time. Keeping track of the whereabouts of all the EHCs was also tackled, as was simplifying how the work was booked. The result was a combination of a cloud storage system and a custom-built database called Scooby, which Roger will be presenting at the OV Conference.

Now retired from clinical practice, Roger actively manages the export work – which he says has become significantly easier these days!