I've been thinking about technology- specifically technology for networking and communication- a lot lately.
I've come to the conclusion that, by and large, veterinary medicine is either uninterested or stuck in the past. For example, love it or hate it, Twitter is continuing to increase in prevalence as a way that businesses and organizations choose to connect with customers, consumers and otherwise interested parties. There are a handful of veterinary related organizations on Twitter (AVMA, AVMA's governmental relations arm, some individual animal hospitals and vets, a few professional organizations- Texas Veterinary Medical Association, American Animal Hospital Association and American Society for Veterinary Journalists are especially active- and a few vet schools with varying degrees of activity.) But overall, vets refuse to take the time to do it.
I, however, really love all of the technology that exists right now. I blog, I tweet, I post. I want more of my peers and colleagues to come do it with me!
Showing posts with label things that strike me. Show all posts
Showing posts with label things that strike me. Show all posts
Monday, February 14, 2011
Thursday, February 10, 2011
Things I’m Tired of Hearing
There are some things that they tell us a lot during vet school that I’ve gotten really tired of hearing.
1) “Grades don’t matter!”
That is just, quite frankly, not true to me! It may be that nobody’s really going to look at your GPA when you get a job (though, I don’t really believe that), but that doesn’t mean grades don’t matter. What if you want an internship or a residency? Or what if you just don’t not want an internship or a residency? (You just don’t want to close that door yet?) Or, what if you’re just accustomed to getting good grades? What if just the getting of good grades is what matters to you?
2) “You’ll get this later.”
We hear this a lot in lecture. They’ll be talking about something and mention a caveat or a detail (or even sometimes another major concept) then backpedal with “but you’ll get that later.” Uh, guys, we’re nearing the end of third year; there’s not a lot of later left!
3) x% of you will be divorced
That’s not very nice… but they’ve been telling us that throughout vet school. In orientation it was that some percent of you will get divorced by the end of vet school (and some more by the end of vet school.) Later they start telling us that x% of us that have gotten married in school or made it past the relationship killer that was vet school will get divorced once we start in practice because we apparently can’t balance our lives. It feels kind of like the people who tell you that you shouldn’t bother getting married because half of marriages end in divorce (although, I read recently that statistic is changing and fewer marriages are ending in divorce.)
1) “Grades don’t matter!”
That is just, quite frankly, not true to me! It may be that nobody’s really going to look at your GPA when you get a job (though, I don’t really believe that), but that doesn’t mean grades don’t matter. What if you want an internship or a residency? Or what if you just don’t not want an internship or a residency? (You just don’t want to close that door yet?) Or, what if you’re just accustomed to getting good grades? What if just the getting of good grades is what matters to you?
2) “You’ll get this later.”
We hear this a lot in lecture. They’ll be talking about something and mention a caveat or a detail (or even sometimes another major concept) then backpedal with “but you’ll get that later.” Uh, guys, we’re nearing the end of third year; there’s not a lot of later left!
3) x% of you will be divorced
That’s not very nice… but they’ve been telling us that throughout vet school. In orientation it was that some percent of you will get divorced by the end of vet school (and some more by the end of vet school.) Later they start telling us that x% of us that have gotten married in school or made it past the relationship killer that was vet school will get divorced once we start in practice because we apparently can’t balance our lives. It feels kind of like the people who tell you that you shouldn’t bother getting married because half of marriages end in divorce (although, I read recently that statistic is changing and fewer marriages are ending in divorce.)
Wednesday, October 13, 2010
It's Like Being 14 Again
One of my professors recently said that being a 3rd year in vet school is like being 15. You're almost grown up, and you want it so bad, but there's nothing you can do to speed it up. It's so close you can taste it, but it's just out of reach.
But, I think that it's like being 14. The dream, the growing up, the independance of it all is so close. The license is close. But 4th year is like being 15. You're almost there. You've got a learners permit. You get to try it in real life. There are real risks and real rewards but there's someone there watching over you, guarding your back.
I can't wait. I want to grow up!
But, I think that it's like being 14. The dream, the growing up, the independance of it all is so close. The license is close. But 4th year is like being 15. You're almost there. You've got a learners permit. You get to try it in real life. There are real risks and real rewards but there's someone there watching over you, guarding your back.
I can't wait. I want to grow up!
Tuesday, September 28, 2010
My Own Animals Are a Great Learning Experience
My kitty, Elli, has a long and sordid medical history (this is my favorite way to start this story! It’s the vet student equivalent of “on a dark and stormy night…”)
The important part of her history is that she has a history of (really severe) reaction to vaccinations. This is really not all that uncommon, though I would argue that the degree of severity she had is out of the ordinary. She also is really freaked out at the vet… she spikes a stress fever and even develops a heart murmur only in the clinic (I can hear it at the clinic and not at home, and she’s even had an echocardiogram).
When we moved back to vet school after a summer at home, I noticed that Elli was coughing. She’d had a coughing spell for a couple minutes a couple times a week. One of those all out cat coughs where they flatten themselves toward the ground and streeeeetch their necks out. I took her home with me to the Banfield I worked at over the summer and we narrowed it down to being feline asthma or potentially an upper respiratory tract infection. We ended up giving her depo-medrol (a long acting steroid) with a presumptive diagnosis of feline asthma.
A week and a half later, I noticed that she has a mass about the size of a pecan right where she got the injection.
I talked to one of the feline internal medicine professors (Dr. Zoran) about her medical history, long term and her more recent. She told me to never ever ever again give Elli depo-medrol, because she’s probably reacting to the substances that make the depo-medrol a long acting steroid. She told me to aspirate the mass and take the stained slides to Dr. Barton (the oncologist/cytologist). I actually went and told Dr. Barton the same story and she told me that she’s never seen/heard of/read about a sarcoma (cancer) associated with depo-medrol (though they are associated with vaccines). She gave me instructions about what kind of sample to take (she wanted a core biopsy.)
My friend Ashley and I pinned Elli down at home and took a core biopsy of the mass. When we pulled the needle out, she oozed out some lemon pudding consistency material. (Don’t you love how pathology uses food descriptions?) So we took an impression smear of that and then decided to try to aspirate the mass.
I stained the slides then looked at them with Dr. Barton. We went over them and found the mass was just full of necrotic tissue, with some degenerating neutrophils and a little bit of the drug.
It’s fun to learn from my own pets! (Though, I hope Elli doesn’t develop any more medical problems for a long time!)
The important part of her history is that she has a history of (really severe) reaction to vaccinations. This is really not all that uncommon, though I would argue that the degree of severity she had is out of the ordinary. She also is really freaked out at the vet… she spikes a stress fever and even develops a heart murmur only in the clinic (I can hear it at the clinic and not at home, and she’s even had an echocardiogram).
When we moved back to vet school after a summer at home, I noticed that Elli was coughing. She’d had a coughing spell for a couple minutes a couple times a week. One of those all out cat coughs where they flatten themselves toward the ground and streeeeetch their necks out. I took her home with me to the Banfield I worked at over the summer and we narrowed it down to being feline asthma or potentially an upper respiratory tract infection. We ended up giving her depo-medrol (a long acting steroid) with a presumptive diagnosis of feline asthma.
A week and a half later, I noticed that she has a mass about the size of a pecan right where she got the injection.
I talked to one of the feline internal medicine professors (Dr. Zoran) about her medical history, long term and her more recent. She told me to never ever ever again give Elli depo-medrol, because she’s probably reacting to the substances that make the depo-medrol a long acting steroid. She told me to aspirate the mass and take the stained slides to Dr. Barton (the oncologist/cytologist). I actually went and told Dr. Barton the same story and she told me that she’s never seen/heard of/read about a sarcoma (cancer) associated with depo-medrol (though they are associated with vaccines). She gave me instructions about what kind of sample to take (she wanted a core biopsy.)
My friend Ashley and I pinned Elli down at home and took a core biopsy of the mass. When we pulled the needle out, she oozed out some lemon pudding consistency material. (Don’t you love how pathology uses food descriptions?) So we took an impression smear of that and then decided to try to aspirate the mass.
I stained the slides then looked at them with Dr. Barton. We went over them and found the mass was just full of necrotic tissue, with some degenerating neutrophils and a little bit of the drug.
It’s fun to learn from my own pets! (Though, I hope Elli doesn’t develop any more medical problems for a long time!)
Wednesday, April 28, 2010
“… and then you had an epiphany.”
Love him or hate him, I find Dr. Willard’s lecture style in our (pre-)correlates class hilarious.
We’re given a case presentation and lab data about a week before class and are expected to generate a list of the most likely diagnoses, a set of tests we’d like to run to narrow it down more, and what we would do to treat the animal right then. In class, he calls on people from the class roster and asks them questions about the case. (He’s always going to ask you why you said what you said, too.)
If you’re wrong, he corrects you by saying, “… and then you had an epiphany…”
I have to try really hard not to crack up every time he says it! It such a hilarious and tactful way to say that you’re wrong and you should try again. (It can get frustrating, though, to watch a classmate flounder while you have an answer you’d like to give.)
We’re given a case presentation and lab data about a week before class and are expected to generate a list of the most likely diagnoses, a set of tests we’d like to run to narrow it down more, and what we would do to treat the animal right then. In class, he calls on people from the class roster and asks them questions about the case. (He’s always going to ask you why you said what you said, too.)
If you’re wrong, he corrects you by saying, “… and then you had an epiphany…”
I have to try really hard not to crack up every time he says it! It such a hilarious and tactful way to say that you’re wrong and you should try again. (It can get frustrating, though, to watch a classmate flounder while you have an answer you’d like to give.)
Thursday, April 15, 2010
“Expertise generally consists of doing a lot of small, boring, seemingly insignificant things very, very well”
Dr. Willard said this to the Internal Medicine club at a lunch meeting at one point and it’s really stuck with me. Because, it’s really true but I’d never thought about it that way before.
On TV, the experts in things have these really cool, sexy jobs where they do awesome stuff all the time. And while veterinarians get to do some really awesome things and save animal lives and such, the process of getting there and the process of doing it are actually rather small, boring and tedious.
As we’re going through the process of learning how to put together our cases for third year correlates, it turns out the process of diagnostic medicine is quite tedious. It’s nothing like House. Granted, we’re generally doing less rare (“zebra”) cases and more routine (“horse”) cases. Also, veterinary medicine is still very closely tied to your clients’ economics, unlike human medicine. We can’t just run hundreds of dollars of tests and hope something sticks, we have to pick the 1 or 2 tests that are most likely to get you the answer you need because that’s all your client is going to pay for.
So, basically, I’m going to keep trying to do these small, seemingly insignificant things very, very well!
On TV, the experts in things have these really cool, sexy jobs where they do awesome stuff all the time. And while veterinarians get to do some really awesome things and save animal lives and such, the process of getting there and the process of doing it are actually rather small, boring and tedious.
As we’re going through the process of learning how to put together our cases for third year correlates, it turns out the process of diagnostic medicine is quite tedious. It’s nothing like House. Granted, we’re generally doing less rare (“zebra”) cases and more routine (“horse”) cases. Also, veterinary medicine is still very closely tied to your clients’ economics, unlike human medicine. We can’t just run hundreds of dollars of tests and hope something sticks, we have to pick the 1 or 2 tests that are most likely to get you the answer you need because that’s all your client is going to pay for.
So, basically, I’m going to keep trying to do these small, seemingly insignificant things very, very well!
Monday, March 22, 2010
Antimicrobial Resistance
I’ll try not to get too much on a soapbox here, but I feel very strongly about the antimicrobial use in livestock debates that are raging right now.
The gist of the argument from people like the Infectious Disease Society of America and Katie Couric is that livestock producers are using antibiotics willy-nilly in their livestock and that this is contributing to antibiotic resistances that we’re seeing in human medicine.
I have several problems with this assertion. For one, I don’t think that livestock producers are using antibiotics willy-nilly. It isn’t in their economic best interest to do so! They have narrow profit margins on a per animal basis, so they tend to only treat when there’s some kind of economic benefit. The argument they make back here is that “growth promotant” antibiotics are used to treat subclinical protozoal parasite infections. My response to that is that is a subclinical infection and the animals are healthier without the parasites.
For two, why are they so uptight about antibiotic use in animals? Have they looked at the use of antibiotics in human medicine lately? Most doctors throw antibiotics at people when they come in for the sniffles. Also, most people don’t complete their antibiotic courses. So, my general feeling here is that while veterinarians do probably need to clean up their act with regards to prudent use of antibiotics, those human medicine folk need to clean their own house before they complain about our dusting.
The gist of the argument from people like the Infectious Disease Society of America and Katie Couric is that livestock producers are using antibiotics willy-nilly in their livestock and that this is contributing to antibiotic resistances that we’re seeing in human medicine.
I have several problems with this assertion. For one, I don’t think that livestock producers are using antibiotics willy-nilly. It isn’t in their economic best interest to do so! They have narrow profit margins on a per animal basis, so they tend to only treat when there’s some kind of economic benefit. The argument they make back here is that “growth promotant” antibiotics are used to treat subclinical protozoal parasite infections. My response to that is that is a subclinical infection and the animals are healthier without the parasites.
For two, why are they so uptight about antibiotic use in animals? Have they looked at the use of antibiotics in human medicine lately? Most doctors throw antibiotics at people when they come in for the sniffles. Also, most people don’t complete their antibiotic courses. So, my general feeling here is that while veterinarians do probably need to clean up their act with regards to prudent use of antibiotics, those human medicine folk need to clean their own house before they complain about our dusting.
Saturday, April 4, 2009
Small Animal Clinicians v. Large Animal Clinicians
The difference between small and large animal clinicians never ceases to amaze me. While I am in no way interested in large animal medicine, I like the doctors in the large animal hospital so much better!
They joke with each other, they joke with the students, they give more interesting tours. In general, they are just way less uptight. I really appreciate that. I think it will make the required large animal rotations 3rd and 4th year a lot more bearable. Even if I don't like/care about the information, at least they all try to make learning fun!
They joke with each other, they joke with the students, they give more interesting tours. In general, they are just way less uptight. I really appreciate that. I think it will make the required large animal rotations 3rd and 4th year a lot more bearable. Even if I don't like/care about the information, at least they all try to make learning fun!
Friday, April 3, 2009
White Coat Ceremony
Today is our White Coat Ceremony. When it was introduced to us, they said it's traditionally a marker of your transition from preclinical to clinical studies. While that sounds like a lovely idea, it seems a bit premature. Second year is completely classroom just like first year (though they apparently spend less time in lab, which will be nice.) Third year starts a combination of clinical and classroom. So, I think maybe the White Coat Ceremony would fit better between second and third years.
Oh well, it should be a nice ceremony and a nice white lab coat. (though I still wish I had a lab coat like the ones on Bones. They manage to have a shape, besides giant solid color rectangle.)
Oh well, it should be a nice ceremony and a nice white lab coat. (though I still wish I had a lab coat like the ones on Bones. They manage to have a shape, besides giant solid color rectangle.)
Friday, October 17, 2008
The cool thing about being a first year
Or at least, one of them.
Some background: This week, I took my parents' dog, Raz, in to the Teaching Hospital to get the mass on his face evaluated then removed.
It's really cool how excited everyone-- older students and clinicians-- is to talk the you, the first year. They like to ask about your classes (and reminisce about how awful anatomy and physiology are.) They like to tell you that it will get better. They like to tell you stories from their own time. They like to offer to let you help out during procedures and show you around. It's really nice to feel like they're all really excited that you're there and that they want to teach you and want you to do well!
Some background: This week, I took my parents' dog, Raz, in to the Teaching Hospital to get the mass on his face evaluated then removed.
It's really cool how excited everyone-- older students and clinicians-- is to talk the you, the first year. They like to ask about your classes (and reminisce about how awful anatomy and physiology are.) They like to tell you that it will get better. They like to tell you stories from their own time. They like to offer to let you help out during procedures and show you around. It's really nice to feel like they're all really excited that you're there and that they want to teach you and want you to do well!
Tuesday, October 7, 2008
Auction Barn
Well, food animal medicine is definitely out. I have full, 100% eliminated that from my possible career choices! (Not that I was ever seriously considering it. I really am down to lab animal medicine or small animal practice, essentially depending on how much I want to put myself through more school when I finish my DVM.)
Today, I went to the Auction Barn for Correlates class. It was... horrifying, and kind of scary. I mean, I know they're trying to find the best/safest/most humane way to quickly move a lot of animals... but... still.
We were sitting in the back watching the cow/bull auction. And, it was just painful to watch them shock the cow up for bid multiple times. I understand that the buyers need to be able to see all sides of the animal (to look for things like bad eyes/limbs/teats/whatever)... but, it's sad to see an animal run into the chute looking terrified then see it get shocked 4 or 5 times to keep it spinning.
Then, in the back, it was even worse! There was 1 guy that I really couldn't tell what he was shocking the cows for, except maybe for fun. They were trying to get them into the chute kind of single file, but he was paying attention to this set of them that were in the back (pointing the wrong direction) and he'd shock their butts. This does not make them turn around... it just makes them try harder to go straight... The thing about animals is they run AWAY from pain, not towards it.
It was just... really sad.
Today, I went to the Auction Barn for Correlates class. It was... horrifying, and kind of scary. I mean, I know they're trying to find the best/safest/most humane way to quickly move a lot of animals... but... still.
We were sitting in the back watching the cow/bull auction. And, it was just painful to watch them shock the cow up for bid multiple times. I understand that the buyers need to be able to see all sides of the animal (to look for things like bad eyes/limbs/teats/whatever)... but, it's sad to see an animal run into the chute looking terrified then see it get shocked 4 or 5 times to keep it spinning.
Then, in the back, it was even worse! There was 1 guy that I really couldn't tell what he was shocking the cows for, except maybe for fun. They were trying to get them into the chute kind of single file, but he was paying attention to this set of them that were in the back (pointing the wrong direction) and he'd shock their butts. This does not make them turn around... it just makes them try harder to go straight... The thing about animals is they run AWAY from pain, not towards it.
It was just... really sad.
Wednesday, August 20, 2008
What We DON'T Know
Quite frequently when I read science textbooks I'm struck by what an incredible volume of knowledge we have accumulated about a wide array of topics.
But, almost as frequently, I'm struck by how much we DON'T know. (And also by how much we think we know, but then find out we were wrong about.)
Right now I'm reading pretty general information about bones-- such as how to classify bones by shape (which is more touchy-feely than classifying them by location)-- and I come across this statement:
"The exact constitution of the crystal lattice is still under study, [...]"
And it is just incredible to me that we know so many things about the bones, and their structure and their function and their histology, but we're missing something so fundamental as the constitution of the crystal lattice.
(Also, apparently, if you soak a dog fibula in hydrochloric acid for a day, you can then tie it in a knot.)
But, almost as frequently, I'm struck by how much we DON'T know. (And also by how much we think we know, but then find out we were wrong about.)
Right now I'm reading pretty general information about bones-- such as how to classify bones by shape (which is more touchy-feely than classifying them by location)-- and I come across this statement:
"The exact constitution of the crystal lattice is still under study, [...]"
And it is just incredible to me that we know so many things about the bones, and their structure and their function and their histology, but we're missing something so fundamental as the constitution of the crystal lattice.
(Also, apparently, if you soak a dog fibula in hydrochloric acid for a day, you can then tie it in a knot.)
Tuesday, August 19, 2008
Horse Doctoring in the Dark Ages
My physiology lab professor was in practice at Ohio State Univeristy a long, long time ago (he says.) It was far enough back that bags of sterile IV fluid didn't exist for horses. (I'm not exactly sure when those came about, but apparently a while ago.)
He was talking to us about calculating osmolarity of solutions because it was something they had to do frequently when mixing up batches of salt to pour into water to use for IV fluids. (You can't put pure water into veins or realllllly bad things happen.)
As he was talking, he said that after a while of his horse doctoring, he would get calls in the middle of the night at home about horses he had on fluids running fevers. His first response was always to change out the resevoir of IV fluids, because "sometimes there are varmints."
Oh, to be a horse doctor in the dark ages! I'm glad things are a little more advanced than that now!
He was talking to us about calculating osmolarity of solutions because it was something they had to do frequently when mixing up batches of salt to pour into water to use for IV fluids. (You can't put pure water into veins or realllllly bad things happen.)
As he was talking, he said that after a while of his horse doctoring, he would get calls in the middle of the night at home about horses he had on fluids running fevers. His first response was always to change out the resevoir of IV fluids, because "sometimes there are varmints."
Oh, to be a horse doctor in the dark ages! I'm glad things are a little more advanced than that now!
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