{"id":4755,"date":"2019-05-03T16:04:30","date_gmt":"2019-05-03T20:04:30","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/qa.vet.purdue.edu\/news\/?p=4755"},"modified":"2025-12-02T08:22:53","modified_gmt":"2025-12-02T13:22:53","slug":"dr-freeman-retire","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/vet.purdue.edu\/news\/dr-freeman-retire.php","title":{"rendered":"Small Animal Surgeon Lynetta Freeman Honored Upon Retirement"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

Bittersweet is the word that characterized the sentiment at a reception held in honor of Dr. Lynetta Freeman<\/a> on the occasion of her retirement at the end of 2018 as professor of small animal surgery in the Department of Veterinary Clinical Sciences (VCS<\/a>). The reception in the Continuum Caf\u00e9 December 14 attracted a crowd of faculty, staff, students, friends, and family.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Dr. Freeman was hailed as a pioneering\nveterinarian who made a significant impact on the College of Veterinary\nMedicine and the Department of Veterinary Clinical Sciences both as an\ninnovative specialist in small animal surgery and as an educator committed to\nimproving opportunities for students to gain surgical expertise and experience.\nShe was introduced at the reception by VCS Department Head Catharine\nScott-Moncrieff<\/a> who described her background and\naccomplishments.<\/p>\n\n\n

\n
\"Dr.
Dr. Lynetta Freeman displays the commemorative gift she received as she is joined by (left-right) Dr. Gert Breur, Department of Veterinary Clinical Sciences Head Catharine Scott-Moncrieff, Dean Willie Reed, and Dr. George Wodicka, Dane A. Miller Head of Weldon School of Biomedical Engineering, at her retirement Friday, December 1<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/div>\n\n\n

Dr. Freeman earned her DVM degree at Oklahoma State\nUniversity in 1981 and went on to complete an internship at Colorado State\nUniversity before spending a year in small animal practice in Oklahoma City.\nShe then went to Washington State University where she completed a small animal\nsurgery residency before joining the veterinary faculty at Mississippi State\nUniversity as assistant professor of small animal surgery. In 1989, she went\ninto private industry, accepting a position as a senior scientist at Ethicon.\nTwo years later she became board certified by the American College of\nVeterinary Surgeons (ACVS). By 2000, Dr. Freeman had risen to the position of\ndirector of Ethicon\u2019s Bariatric Surgery Innovation Team. She was extensively\ninvolved in developing medical devices to perform minimally invasive surgical\nprocedures at Ethicon and is a named inventor on 23 patents.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

In the midst of all this success, Dr. Freeman chose to make a major career change and came back to academia in 2006 when she joined the Purdue faculty, accepting a joint appointment in the College of Veterinary Medicine\u2019s Department of Veterinary Clinical Sciences and the Weldon School of Biomedical Engineering. Since then, Dr. Freeman has been productive and influential in scientific discovery, engagement, and teaching.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Dr. Scott-Moncrieff described how Dr. Freeman\u2019s research has\nfocused on advancing minimally invasive surgery and improving wound healing.\n\u201cShe was the first to describe laparoscopic ovariohysterectomy in dogs 20 years\nago and has participated in teaching minimally invasive surgery to\nveterinarians since that time,\u201d Dr. Scott-Moncrieff said. As editor of the\nfirst minimally invasive surgery textbook for veterinarians, Dr. Freeman is one\nof only five charter members of the Veterinary Endoscopy Society.<\/p>\n\n\n

\n
\"Dr.
Dr. Lynetta Freeman is surrounded by student well-wishers at her retirement reception.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/div>\n\n\n

Dr. Scott-Moncrieff also pointed out how Dr. Freeman\ncollaborated with physicians at Indiana University to perform natural orifice\ntransluminal endoscopy surgery, or \u201cNOTES.\u201d Recognized internationally for her\nexpertise in minimally invasive surgery, Dr. Freeman has been invited to speak\nabroad on numerous occasions. She also collaborated with Purdue biomedical\nengineers to study the effects of mechanically active bandages and other\ncompounds that promote wound healing. Dr. Freeman\u2019s honors include receiving\nthe Pfizer Award for Excellence in Research and being recognized as an American\nCollege of Veterinary Surgeons founding fellow in minimally invasive surgery. She\nwas promoted to full professor this past year.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Dr. Scott-Moncrieff went on to explain how Dr. Freeman also has been heavily involved in teaching and engagement during her Purdue tenure. She implemented organizational changes in third-year surgery courses that had a documented positive impact on student learning, Dr. Scott-Moncrieff noted.  Additionally, she led the development and implementation of the Priority 4 Paws service learning initiative. Launched in 2012, Priority 4 Paws features a mobile surgery unit that travels to partnering animal shelters within a day\u2019s drive of the Purdue campus to spay and neuter shelter dogs and cats so that they can be adopted more quickly. The program not only has helped the animal shelters, but also has expanded educational opportunities for fourth-year veterinary students who take part in an elective rotation in shelter medicine and surgery.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Dr. Scott-Moncrieff praised Dr. Freeman for having a major\nimpact on the learning of PVM students as well as for her work to document the\nscholarship involved in the Priority 4 Paws program, for which she received the\nPVM Scholarship of Engagement Award in 2017.  \u201cWe\u2019re really going to miss\nyou,\u201d Dr. Scott Moncrieff told Dr. Freeman. \u201cYou\u2019re an energetic and engaging\nperson.  You always have enthusiasm for whatever you\u2019re doing and I\u2019ve\nreally appreciated working with you since you joined us in 2006.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Other faculty and staff members also shared comments, including\nDr. Freeman\u2019s colleague, Professor of Small Animal Surgery Gert Breur, who\nemphasized that many small animal surgery residents learned endoscopic surgery\nfrom her since, for a number of years, she was the only one in the small animal\nsurgery section with that skill set. \u201cShe did endoscopic surgery when it wasn\u2019t\nthat popular yet,\u201d Dr. Breur commented.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Then Dr. Breur introduced a surprise guest, who joined the event via a teleconference call, much to Dr. Freeman\u2019s surprise. Dr. Betsy Swanson, a previous resident who she had advised, thanked her for her support during the ups and downs of her residency. \u201cYou were guiding and supporting at the low points, and cheering at the high points,\u201d said Dr. Swanson, who now is assistant professor of small animal surgery at Mississippi State University. \u201cYou are so much more than your career accomplishments and academic credentials,\u201d Dr. Swanson said. \u201cAnybody who has ever known you and worked with you recognizes your spirit, your determination, your enthusiasm and energy, and most of all your warm personality and wide open arms of friendship that you offer to everybody.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

As part of the ceremony, Dr. Freeman received a commemorative\ngift with an engraving of the Continuum sculpture. Dean Reed also read a letter\nfrom the Purdue Provost announcing her new designation as professor emeritus of\nsmall animal surgery and biomedical engineering.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Bittersweet is the word that characterized the sentiment at a reception held in honor of Dr. Lynetta Freeman on the occasion of her retirement at the end of 2018 as professor of small animal surgery in the Department of Veterinary Clinical Sciences.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":7,"featured_media":3241,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[41,29],"tags":[8,367,598,785,120,279,196,62],"class_list":["post-4755","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-faculty-staff","category-our-people","tag-faculty","tag-lynetta-freeman","tag-our-people","tag-priority-4-paws","tag-retirement","tag-small-animal-surgery","tag-spring","tag-vcs"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/vet.purdue.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4755","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/vet.purdue.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/vet.purdue.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/vet.purdue.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/7"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/vet.purdue.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=4755"}],"version-history":[{"count":13,"href":"https:\/\/vet.purdue.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4755\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":31752,"href":"https:\/\/vet.purdue.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4755\/revisions\/31752"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/vet.purdue.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/3241"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/vet.purdue.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=4755"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/vet.purdue.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=4755"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/vet.purdue.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=4755"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}