The ABVA Council
The ABVA is managed by a group of individuals who both practice veterinary acupuncture themselves and who have a desire to help the ABVA and its members move forwards in the teaching and promotion of veterinary acupuncture both in the UK and further afield.
ABVA President
Heike Kopac
“I qualified as a vet in Germany and have worked in first opinion practice in the UK since1993, first in mixed and then in small animal practice. I have practised acupuncture for 20 years, usually fitting it into my routine consults with small animals and the occasional horse visit. After the birth of my second child I set up my company Holistic Vet Care in East Yorkshire and have provided acupuncture for small animals and horses in East Yorkshire for 10 years.
I now combine work as a Locum small animal vet four days a week with private acupuncture. Nowthat my children are a little bit older I feel I can give a little bit of time to my favourite subject of acupuncture and try and help develop it in this country, so last year I joined the Council. We are all busy vets with busy private lives but if we can devote just a little bit of time to spread the word about acupuncture as well as trying to improve our understanding of it, it should be worthwhile. Apart from attending the regular meetings and help with general organisation I am responsible for answering questions from the website and keep members details up to date. This year I helped to man the ABVA stand at the London Vet Show and was amazed how many vets are interested in acupuncture".
Coordinator and Lecturer
Jen Porter
Jen graduated from the Royal Veterinary College in 2004 and has since worked in both mixed, equine and small animal practice in Hertfordshire, Bedfordshire and Surrey. She began her study of acupuncture in 2006 with the ABVA Foundation Course and followed this with ABVA Advanced TCM and Electroacupuncture courses, being awarded the ABVA CertSCVA in 2009. Since then she has been a member of the ABVA Council and has prepared and delivered teaching on the ABVA Foundation Course as well as formulating and delivering the Small Animal Recap course. She has also managed the ABVA since 2011.
Now a Lecturer in Veterinary Clinical Practice at the University of Surrey School of Veterinary Medicine, Jen was awarded a PGCert in Veterinary Education in 2018 and is a Fellow of the Higher Education Academy. She also acheived her Postgraduate Diploma in Clinical Animal Behaviour from the University of Edinburgh in 2023.
Jen lives in the New Forest with her husband and two young daughters, where she accepts acupucture referrals and treats pets in their own homes, alongside lecturing and working towards her accreditation as Clinical Animal Behaviourist.
Education Consultant
Dietrich Graf von Schweinitz
"A former President of the ABVA, I have been especially involved in organising and lecturing on the courses as well as recruiting the Spring Meeting guest speakers for many years. I have also served on the IVAS Education Committee and Board of Directors. I founded an equine practice in Guildford, Surrey which I recently sold and I now practice referral acupuncture and provide teaching both here and abroad.
I have carried out and published pioneering research in the thermographoc monitoring of autonomic responses ot acupuncture in horses with chronic pain syndromes and in-needle electromyographic recordings of myofacial trigger points in horses. More recently, I hav authored the papers 'Electroacupuncture for nerve injury in the horse' (Equine Veterinary Education, 2014) and 'Acupuncture for pain control' (Current Therapy in Equine Medicine, 2015).
Treasurer
Claire Greenway
Council Members
Gwen Covey-Crump
Charles Foster
Bettina Teichmann