DOCTOR

Brian H. Birthright

Doctor of Veterinary Medicine

Dr. Birthright's love of the mountains since childhood, brought him from Tuscaloosa, Alabama to Waynesville, NC.  Since graduating from Auburn School of Veterinary Medicine, he has wanted to open his own hospital and practice a high level of medical care including internal medicine, surgery and emergency/critical care. 

Brian enjoys mountain and road bicycling, motorcycling and kayaking.  His interests include anything in the great outdoors of the North Carolina mountains with his trusty companion, Flip.

MANAGEMENT

Ms. Carol A. Sapp,

Certified Veterinary Practice Manager

Carol has been involved in veterinary medicine for over 25 years in Florida.  She started as a veterinary assistant for an equine veterinarian.  During that time, Carol owned and showed horses and loved traveling to all the different horse farms and dairies.  Later, she became the office manager/veterinary assistant with the same veterinarian when he decided to build a hospital for dogs, cats and horses.

Carol is a CVPM (Certified Veterinary Practice Manager).  She met Dr. Birthright when he was in the process of building Maple Tree Veterinary Hospital.  Carol and her business partner came up from Florida to help Dr. Birthright get the new hospital up and running.  After a few visits back to fine tune some things, she realized that she was growing attached to Waynesville and the hospital staff.  She was officially hired as hospital manager in October 2005 and has moved to Waynesville permanently.

Carol loves hiking and camping with her yellow lab, Banjo.

Veterinary Assistants

Ms. Tammi Dinges

Tammi graduated with a Bachelor of Science degree in psychology from Pennsylvania State University.  After managing group homes for a few years, she went back to her roots in biology and began managing a small one doctor veterinary practice in Sylva. 

Tammi joined the staff at Maple Tree Veterinary Hospital in August of 2005. She brings her knowledge and skill in every area of veterinary medicine as well as inventory and human resource management. 

Tammi and her partner, Matt have two well-loved pets Cypress,(black labrador retriever) and Fluffernutter . Tammi enjoys hiking, camping and backpacking with Cypress. 

Ms. Kimber Thomas

Kimber has had an interest in animals practically since she was born.  She is a student at AB Tech Community College on her way to becoming a Certified Veterinary Technician.  She loves large as well as small animals.  She and her husband, Justin have 4 dogs, 2 cats, and 2 rats.  Kimber is one of our surgical technicians; she monitors surgical patients from the beginning of surgery through recovery.

Kimber loves the outdoors, bear hunting and tubing.

Ms. Bonnie Tucker

Bonnie has been a veterinary assistant for 5 years and loves what she does. 

She moved to Western North Carolina from upstate New York.  She has 3 sons, 1 grandchild and let's not forget the furry children - 6 dogs and 3 cats.

Bonnie's love for animals is incredible and quite evident to all that come to visit our clinic.

Mr. Kerry Ybanez

Kerry has had multiple years of veterinary experience in standard emergency and intensive care. He enjoys all animals; large, small, exotic and avian.  Recently, Kerry became a surgical assistant.

He has one fabulous pet named, Jack.  Jack was a stray when Kerry and his fiancee, Stacey took him home in March 2006.  In his leisure time, Kerry enjoys playing the guitar.

Reception

Mrs. Lori Cagle

Lori started in the veterinary field 15 years ago.  She specialized in horses for the first 5 years then started working with small animals as well.

Lori has two pets, Chloe, her cat and Mariah, her dog.  She enjoys camping, hiking with her family and teaching painting/crafts.

Ms. Emily Wyche

Emily is currently attending Western Carolina University.  She is planning to graduate in May of 2009.

Emily has always loved animals and recently adopted a Corgi mix puppy named Rusty as her very own first dog. She enjoys spending time with Rusty, and anything outdoors especially swimming, hiking and camping.