Elena is a veterinarian with a focus in animal welfare, shelter animal populations, veterinary ethics, and animal behavior. She is a faculty member at Long Island University College of Veterinary Medicine where she is an assistant professor of animal welfare and behavior. She also serves on the university’s Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion Committee. Elena also assists in teaching veterinary ethics to second year veterinary students at Colorado State University College of Veterinary Medicine and Biomedical Sciences.
In 2007, Elena made a career change into veterinary medicine, and specifically shelter medicine. She received a doctor of veterinary medicine degree in 2013 from Ross University in Saint Kitts, where she received Ross University’s Eliza Anna Grier full tuition diversity scholarship. She was also one of the inaugural recipients to earn Maddie’s Professional Certificate in Shelter Medicine from the University of Florida’s online certification program in 2013.
After vet school, Elena completed a Small Animal Shelter Medicine and Surgery Internship and a Shelter Research Fellowship at Colorado State University (CSU). Elena then received her PhD in Veterinary Clinical Sciences from CSU in 2019. Elena is also the 2017 recipient of the first Winn Feline Foundation (now EveryCat Health Foundation) and Miller Trust New Feline Investigator Award, which supported her grant to assess novel non-invasive methods of measuring chronic stress in cats. While Elena resided in Colorado, she was the medical director and veterinarian at a feline nonprofit organization that focused on trap-neuter-return (TNR), the care and sterilization of community cats, and the provision of feline veterinary services to low-income communities.
Prior to veterinary school, Elena worked and volunteered with nonprofit, conservation, and healthcare organizations for marginalized populations. With a bachelor’s degree in psychology and a minor in art photography, she worked at various inpatient and other psychiatric facilities in New York City. After moving to Colorado, she switched gears and worked for a large international conservation organization and subsequently obtained a master of science degree in ecology from CSU where she studied the effects of rural development on grassland bird populations.
Elena has authored and co-authored numerous publications in the veterinary and psychology fields. She has also received multiple scholarships and awards to support her shelter medicine work, including the American Society for Prevention of Cruelty to Animals (ASPCA) scholarship in 2013 and a Michael Lopez Ferlin Memorial Scholarship from Best Friends Animal Society in 2012.
She is currently pursuing board certification in the American College of Animal Welfare (ACAW). Elena has spent many hours, days, and weeks volunteering at shelters, at spay and neuter clinics—including feral cat clinics—and at low-cost or no-cost veterinary clinics in Mexico, Montana, and Colorado.