Page 26 - Livestock Matters - Summer 2014

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Small animals, Pseudomonas
and a sad lack of sheep
STUDENT DIARY
Alice McLeish
, Edinburgh
Third year veterinary student, Edinburgh University
At the moment though, I’m seeing practice at
a small animal surgery in Edinburgh. This is
the first time I’ve actually gone to an entirely
small animal practice, which is interesting,
and I’m definitely missing my wellies!
However, it is exciting to see more intricate
surgeries, such as orthopaedics, and to
see the difference between economic
considerations in treating farm animals and
the sentimental value of pets. It’s interesting,
and good for my clinical knowledge, seeing
the vets working through every possibility with
all the diagnostics to get an exact conclusion
even at the cost of thousands of pounds, but
I’m certainly more comfortable with justifying
treatments for the sake of herd, or public
health, or economic reasons.
One thing I have particularly enjoyed at this
practice though is the in-house laboratory, for
blood testing and basic diagnostics. A case
that has been carrying on through the weeks
I’ve been here, and which I was called
away from writing this article to help with,
has been a dog which presented with severe
respiratory problems, and eventually anaemia
too. We took samples from an area in the
chest that seemed abnormal under X-ray and
ultrasound, and after processing it, found it to
be a Pseudomonas infection, with clearly
visible masses of bacteria on the slides we
produced. This was particularly exciting as
I’d never been any use at viewing slides like
this, but it all made so much more sense
and was far more interesting when it was
related to an actual case that I knew and
cared about.
Hopefully next time I’ll have more relevant
livestock matters (pun fully intended) to talk
about but I realised that I had so little small
animal surgery experience comparatively that
I’d better do a few months of it for now. I’m
missing being around the farms though, so
it definitely hasn’t changed my mind on
wanting to become a livestock vet.
About me
Twenty-one years ago, I met my first sheep
while on holiday on the Isle of Skye. My
delighted parents realised they'd finally
found something to keep me occupied, as
I spent the whole week pressed against
the window of our house, baa-ing at all
the sheep that went past. Jokingly, they
said I must be going to be a vet (I couldn't
say ‘Mummy’ or ‘Daddy’, my vocabulary
consisting entirely of animals and animal
noises). Several years on, here I am in
my third year studying to be a vet in
Edinburgh, the city I grew up in, with the
hope of becoming a mixed practice vet
once I graduate.
Since the last issue, I’ve passed my last set of third-year exams and so
am safely into fourth year, starting in September. I’m looking forward
to this as, after a year of pharmacology, statistics and the cat and dog
course, next semester will include the farm animal course. This will
include lots of practicals at the vet school’s on-site dairy herd, sheep
farm, and large animal hospital which I’ll be able to tell you about in
my next columns.
Edinburgh Vet School in the snow- hopefully not like this for practicals next year
Pseudomonas infection in dog
WORKING
TOGETHER
FOR A HEALTHIER FUTURE...
25
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