I feel so incredibly lucky to be where I am today: two years down as a vet student, on the course of my dreams and heading toward the career I’ve been aspiring to since I was six years old.
And it’s still as surreal, stressful and exciting as ever!
For Bristol uni, at least, the gap between the second and third years is significant in that it’s where we transition from pre-clinical to clinical content; moving from the nice safety bubble of learning and classrooms to more of the practical stuff, and the “this is why you were learning it in the first place”.
Holding pattern
If I’m being honest, it’s a little daunting. It’s uncharted territory – just like the beginning of the course.
I think I’ve fallen into a comfortable pattern of learning, digesting and regurgitating theory, so the idea of breaking away from that is, quite frankly, a little scary. One thing that keeps the nerves at bay, however, is acknowledging how far I’ve already come.
When you start vet school and walk away from those first few lectures realising how much you already have to learn, it can be really hard to envisage how on earth you’re meant to metamorphose into a competent and qualified veterinary surgeon in just five short years. But here I am, two years later… and I think the pieces are starting to come together.
Voyage of discovery
I know so much more now than I ever thought possible: how everything works, why it sometimes stops working and how to make it work again – the gist of any medical degree at its heart.
The fact I will be able to call myself “doctor” in just a few short years still seems incredible, but no longer impossible.
Yes, it’s something new, something slightly intimidating; but I’m so excited to explore this new part of my degree, where I’ll begin to learn new skills I will use for the rest of my career – to start discovering what being a vet actually means, and what kind of vet I want to be.
Looking back, applying to vet school was probably one of the most stressful times of my life – and for good reason.
There’s a lot to get your head around; I was juggling A-levels, work experience, open days and, in hindsight, I‘m so thankful for whatever pearls of wisdom regarding the whole the process I managed to glean in the form of various blogs, websites and face-to-face talks with my local vets.
It’s only been two years since I, too, was anxiously waiting my results. So much has happened since then, vet school of course bringing its own set of trials and triumphs, but nevertheless, as the month of exam results looms I can’t help but empathise with those who are now where I was not so very long ago.
I know when I was at that stage I had so many unanswered questions. About student life, the course, the application requirements… So I’d like to try and help any others who might feel the same way by going through a few misconceptions I heard floating around when I was applying to vet school, with a little bit of friendly advice thrown in for good measure.
Common misconceptions
# 1: It’s all about the grades
Now, to all you budding vets out there, I’d love to tell you that grades don’t matter in the slightest, but the vet course is demanding and most vet schools out there expect the standard three As.
That being said, if you fall short just a little it doesn’t have to be the end of the road. The University of Nottingham requires an A in Chemistry and Biology with a B in another chosen subject, and one of my closest friends in my year was admitted to Bristol with two As and a B. What stood her apart and made the university look past her grades is a part of the application process that outranks exam results in so many ways: interviews.
Universities receive so many applications each year, most of which promise academic excellence and prowess. But, when it comes to sorting through these candidates, what really helps you stand out from the crowd is what you‘re like as a person. Not the letters on a piece of paper, or even your personal statement when all’s said and done – just you. This is where you show your passion, your enthusiasm and, most importantly, get to make eye contact with an actual human being instead of filling out a variety of forms.
It’s daunting, I know. I remember the butterflies at my first and, in fact, all my interviews. But the key thing to remember is you’re only nervous because of how much this means to you, and if you let the interviewer see this for themselves it says far more about you than your grades ever could.
# 2: You will live, sleep and breathe the vet school, you will have time for nothing else
One of the main things I kept hearing, especially on open days, was that the curriculum of vet school was so demanding it would consume my entire student life. I was told many times I would have no time to work, to socialise or live my student life in the same way as the rest of my cohorts.
I know that every uni experience is different and indeed each vet course is different but, in my opinion, it IS possible to have your cake and eat it too.
If you manage to get into vet school you already must have excellent time management skills and so if you’d like to get a small term-time job (I even managed two) or join several societies or explore the nightlife of whatever new city you’re venturing to has to offer, a little time management is all it takes.
I’m not saying you won’t be busier than some of your friends on other courses or that you can slack off – rolling into bed at 4am every morning, but you can have a life outside of vet school if you so wish.
# 3: I need to study all the sciences and have 100 weeks of work experience to be good enough for vet school
Honestly, this one is just plain wrong.
If you’ve got an itch only science can scratch, then by all means enjoy those triple sciences – maybe maths too if you’re that way inclined. But if you’re anything like me and you have a penchant for English, economics, history or something that doesn’t seem entirely “vetty”, unless you’re looking to apply to Cambridge or Glasgow (these do require more “academic” subjects) it is okay not to go down the all-science route.
Vet schools look for well-rounded enthusiastic individuals and if your choice of A-levels are brought up at interview, as they were at mine, it’s much easier to enthuse over a subject you’re genuinely passionate about than one you’re taking for the sake of it. And in regards to work experience, not all of us can be fortunate enough to live within range of three farms, two vet practices, a vet hospital, a cattery, a kennel (etc) or to even have access to, or the funds to travel to, all of them.
As long as you get as much varied work experience to the best of your ability, for example the RVC only asks for a minimum of four weeks, then you won’t be dismissed for not having enough.
We often find ourselves overwhelmed by a complex case – or even numerous cases that are not so complex.
The first step is to try to seek clarity. How do we do this? Well, we start from the beginning and go over everything again.
How and why?
This process happens numerous times on shift – we have little “mini-rounds” sessions where myself and the other clinicians talk through difficult cases from start to where we are now.
It could be to try to determine whether we are missing something, figure out our next step, or work out how we are going to manage what we have diagnosed.
We must always seek clarity to provide us with a pathway forward, reduce stress and anxiety, highlight the next course of action, identify things we have missed, and increase productivity.
Getting together
Have set times for when you regroup. For example:
after morning consults, when you have to develop a plan to work through all the cases you have in hospital
after your initial round of diagnostics
if you have not developed a plan one hour before afternoon consults
Whatever you decide, have set times where you can stop and think, and seek to clear things in your head. The best way to do this is to have a reminder in your mobile phone, or simply agree a set time with your colleagues when you can have a team huddle.
If going through this process helps clear things for you, imagine what would happen if teams did this within their own group of co-workers. Team members would know what was happening, and who would need to do what and why – leading to productive teams with clear pathways.
EMS is something I haven’t touched on too deeply, which is odd considering how much of a vet student’s life it takes up.
For those not familiar with the term, EMS stands for extra-mural studies: work experience conducted outside of university term time.
Each vet school organises its EMS slightly differently, but at Bristol we’re required to complete a total of 12 weeks preclinical work experience over the first two years of our course (“preclinical” essentially meaning anything from shadowing a vet nurse in practice to shovelling manure in a stable). It’s basically to get everybody up to speed where animal handling skills are concerned, regardless of individual animal backgrounds. Levelling the playing field as it were.
As a second year student, this is the world I’m living in and, since I completed roughly 12 weeks of work experience to get into university in the first place, as you can imagine, EMS has become a big part of my life, and roughly a third of this year‘s summer holidays.
Pros and cons
There are highs and lows to every aspect of uni, but it can be difficult not to let the sheer volume of extra work that needs to be done get to you. Vet students, after all, have some of the highest numbers of contact hours among their cohorts, up there with medicine and dental students, who are also required to carry out extra non-curricular work when the majority of the student body are taking three or four months off.
But it’s important to remember there’s a reason for it, and although you’re not yet aiding diagnoses or learning neutering techniques, preclinical EMS teaches you a lot of skills you’ll need to have by the time you first step into practice, such as patience with and confidence around animals.
It can also help prepare you for the harder aspects of the job, and that’s really what I want to address here.
Working on a farm for any decent period of time will allow you to become familiar with two things: life and death.
Death is a part of the veterinary career that’s easy enough to understand as a concept, but far more difficult to teach in practice; vets face the death of patients regularly enough that their mental health as a profession rivals that of human medicine for being so staggeringly low. In my mind, it’s definitely an area of our education that could be improved upon, but the trouble is it’s so difficult to do.
For example, I have been volunteering at my local practice for almost seven years and yet I have never seen an animal euthanised. This isn’t for lack of opportunity but, rather, a case of respecting the owner. I’ve had to leave many a consult once the bad news is broken, regardless of the level of training because, quite understandably, having your animal euthanised is a very personal and emotional experience that you wouldn’t want a stranger observing – especially one with an open notebook and poised pen.
The (other) problem with death
The trouble is, giving patients the space they want and deserve might not be in their best interest in the long run – especially if it goes on to produce a generation of veterinarians who’ve never seen euthanasia until a whole three or four years into their training.
Nobody wants some trainee hovering over such a private and, often, devastating moment – I know I certainly wouldn’t – but if the procedure is to be done with the same level of maturity, professionalism and understanding as it demands, this takes observation and learning, like anything else.
This is one of the reasons why I think EMS plays such a vital role in shaping young vets outside of the lecture theatres and in the real world.
Perfectly placed
My latest placement is on a pig farm, and despite being one of the most enriching and enjoyable weeks I’ve completed so far, it has hit me, emotionally and personally, in way I had not anticipated.
That said, I’m incredibly glad for my experiences over the past week and in every placement I’ve been lucky enough to visit. Farmers and veterinary professionals alike offer up so much of their time and experience to help you improve your own skill set in ways you never even knew it needed. You grow in ways you didn’t expect and your opinions change a little bit each day in light of everything new you learn.
On paper, EMS might sound like a lot of lost holiday time and long days of manual labour but, in reality, you only get out what you put in. And what you get out is often invaluable.
A cuddle was not enough for this patient (see top image) – he clearly wanted to use me to get a better vantage point and sharpen his claws at the same time.
It’s a bit hard to develop a mutually agreed agenda with a cat, but have you ever stopped to consider whether, as a veterinarian, you do that for your clients?
Making an ass of u and me
We assume our clients know what’s going to happen, right?
We start with a history, then a physical examination, then develop a plan, and so on – but this assumption is frequently incorrect, and our clients often don’t know what’s going to happen.
Communicating the agenda is a powerful tool in letting pet owners know what is going to happen next – and when it is delivered in an appropriate way, it allows them to have a say in the plan.
Is it okay?
So, how do we develop a mutually agreed plan? We communicate it and ask if it is okay.
For example, “Is it okay if we talk for a couple of minutes first about what has happened then we will have a look over Fluffy?”, as they could be thinking “Why are we talking and not looking at my sick pet?”.
Another example is when you want to do a full examination first before looking at the sore leg. Some clients may be thinking “why is the vet looking at his mouth, it is back left leg!” – ask: “Is it okay if I check Fluffy over first and then I will look at her sore leg at the end? I just want to make sure everything else is okay.”
Explaining the next steps
When you communicate the agenda, you are informing the clients what is going to happen next. This reduces uncertainty and feelings of anxiety; and helps build trust and rapport as you are being clear, open and honest, and you are inviting them to have input.
This is one important tip for building a partnership with your clients in the consult room, but is also applicable to all staff members and their interactions with clients.
Feedback can be difficult to take on board, especially if you are not accustomed to receiving it. But it is a powerful tool that speeds up your growth.
Don’t be threatened by it… embrace it
You have to flick the switch in your head consciously, because you need feedback to grow professionally.
Therefore, open your arms and breathe it in. This is not always easy, but you need to start somewhere.
It can fast track your professional development
We have our blind spots – we may think we are doing well, but, in reality, may be rubbing people the wrong way or upsetting people.
A great personal example:
I thought I was great to work with in surgery because I did not yell or throw things at people. I am also usually outgoing. However, when I am concentrating in surgery, I don’t speak. Through feedback, I found out this was very unnerving for colleagues – they thought I was unhappy with them. This blew my mind.
Disconnect… or view yourself as a product
If you find it difficult to receive feedback – or if it always feels like it gets the better of you, and you feel anxious, angry or upset (and any associated negative feelings) – then distance yourself from it a bit.
Take a step back personally and view yourself as a product. This has helped me.
If you had a product you were selling, wouldn’t you want feedback to make sure it was good? Thinking of yourself as a product makes you want to ensure you are the best for your job, role or responsibilities.
How to get feedback
It is easier if you ask for feedback before an event or task – for example, before delivering a presentation or going into a meeting. Asking for feedback afterwards means you are ready for it and the person giving you feedback will feel safer providing it.
Also, don’t be attached to the outcome. Feedback is great, whether positive or negative – and you grow more effectively with negative feedback.
Overwhelmed?
If you get feedback and are about to feel overwhelmed… breathe.
Breathe it in, slow your roll and control your emotions as they do not serve you – feedback serves you.
The English summer, though tardy as usual, has finally arrived – and while this is cause for celebration among humans, I thought it best to share a few words of caution about keeping our furry friends equally happy as the temperatures rise.
Around this time of year, vets get a surge of patients coming in with signs of heat stroke, sunburn and dehydration – conditions that can often be prevented with just a few changes to routine and a little extra care.
Unfortunately, dogs can’t sweat through their skin as we can, and rely predominantly on panting, drinking and radiating heat via their noses and paw pads to keep them cool. For this reason, a number of factors should be considered when it comes to making sure your pet is comfortable and healthy in the hotter months.
Heat hints
Looking for signs of panting and lethargy are good ways to tell if your pet is getting uncomfortable, but a good rule of thumb is: if it’s too hot for you in shorts and a T-shirt, it’s probably too hot for your dog in his permanent fluffy jumper.
Dogs’ paws burn very easily on hot days. Please share our five-second rule warning for the summer months pic.twitter.com/4R6YNg6jsD
If your dog requires a muzzle, try to find one that allows it to drink and pant, to help it regulate its own temperature.
On days at the hotter end of the spectrum, it’s also a good idea to walk your dog during the cooler hours – such as in the morning or evening/late afternoon – rather than at midday when the pavements are hottest, as cement and gravel that is too hot can burn its foot pads.
Five second rule
Blue Cross recently posted about a “Hot Day 5 Second Rule” for judging whether it’s too hot to walk your dog. It advises to stand on the pavement barefoot and if it’s too hot for you to bear after five seconds then it’s also too hot for your dog’s feet.
It’s not just dogs, though – cats only sweat through their paws, so they, like dogs, will often choose shadier spots and/or sprawl themselves out over the coolest place in the house or garden they can find.
However, unlike dogs, cats only use panting as a last resort, so if you see your cat panting, it’s a definite indicator you need to help it cool down. If your cat prefers the indoors then by making sure your house is ventilated and cool, with lots of water in supply, it should be pretty self-sufficient, as cats often are.
If you have an outdoor cat, restricting its access to the garden on the hotter days of the year may seem cruel, but it is probably the best thing for it – especially if you’re intending on leaving the house, and won’t be around to let it in to drink and take shelter if it needs to.
Hot exotics
I haven’t seen a lot mentioned online about caring for your exotic pets in a heatwave, so I thought I’d briefly touch on it here. Of course, I’m not an expert, and if you wanted professional advice on how to properly care for your snake, lizard, bird and so on then asking your local vet is definitely the best course of action.
However, small factors exist that people tend not to think about, such as turning off the heat mats and/or lamps in your reptile cages, as they’re not always needed when the external temperature is suitably high. Making sure cages aren’t in direct sunlight, but also aren’t in a draught, can be a fine line, but is also imperative.
This goes for bird cages as well, and it can also help keep the cage cool to keep it lower to the ground (since heat rises) and, of course, provide plenty of water – both for drinking and bathing in certain bird species.
Subtle signs
We all want the best for our pets, and it can be easy to forget their needs are often different to ours in subtle, but important, ways. Knowing the signs of when your pet is happy and when it is not is the best way to help prevent issues such as heat stroke and lower the number of cases seen in practice.
And, as always, if you’re unsure what signs to look for, or what precautions to take at any time of year, don’t hesitate to make an appointment with your vet to get some helpful advice.
What will be will be: this mantra is one of a handful of things that kept me sane during university exam season.
Exam stress has definitely taken its toll, and, one week after finishing, I am still none the wiser as to what day it is or whether I’m coming or going – but that’s the price you pay for memorising everything from organ locations to the proportion of “medium” sized chicken eggs in the UK (38.5%, apparently, for those of you who might be curious).
Exams are a trying time for anyone, no matter your degree, or, in fact, your level of education; I remember GCSEs putting me through my paces.
Aftermath
I’ve already written a lot about exams and their stresses. But, right now, I want to address a different kind of stress – a whole new hurdle to jump when really, in all fairness, you just deserve a break – results day.
In truth, no matter how horrendous my exams ever were, nothing ever succeeded in keeping me up at night like results day. Hours and days and weeks of effort, sweat and most likely a few tears, all culminating in what will inevitably feel like a very anticlimactic, but nevertheless staggeringly significant number of digits on a page (not even a physical page at that when you reach university).
It’s a real reminder of how much you must love your course, and, in my case, how much I want to be a vet. After all, there’s no point going through all that, alongside a few weeks of mandatory poop scooping, more affectionately known as extramural studies (EMS) if the light at the end of the tunnel isn’t worth it.
Treat yourself
But enough about exams, what do you do afterwards?
The term “self-care” is thrown around a lot these days, but I think it’s just as important to treat yourself after exams as it is right before and during. What you just did took time and sacrifice, and, however your results turn out – whether they reflect the effort or not – you should still be so proud of that effort.
You deserve that pot of Ben & Jerry’s (or five), that night out with your friends, or night in, slobbing around in your PJs and a face mask, watching all the Netflix you’ve deprived yourself of for the past month.
Have faith
Yes, results day is a scary prospect and not something to forget about completely, but the fact is, once exams are over, you’ve done what you can, and whatever will be will be.
I find this thought rather comforting; although, for others, I know it’s somewhat frustrating. It takes a lot to relinquish control, especially when it’s something you’ve worked so hard for, but it’s important to have faith in yourself and to take the well-earned rest that is the summer holidays.
It was a couple of weeks before I set off for Bristol and an uncertain, but exciting life on the vet course that my mother – who’s been a member of the medical field for many years – began pointing out various dogs and cats to me as we passed them, stating that, once I began studying medicine, I would never look at these animals in quite the same way.
They would be patients, not just pets, she reminded me. In the same way she herself subconsciously clocked subtle signs and symptoms in the people she interacted with day to day, not even meaning to look for things a person without the same training or knowledge would ever think to look for.
At the time, I was dubious. To my mind, a cavalier King Charles spaniel would always be, to me, an adorable cavalier King Charles spaniel. Two years on, I can, perhaps begrudgingly, admit to her she was right.
A blessing and a curse
I think one of the greatest strengths of any medical profession – their extensive and almost unfathomable reserve of knowledge – is also their greatest curse.
There’s a reason they say doctors and nurses make the worst patients – it’s most likely because when you‘re drilled over your 5-year to 6-year course – whatever your poison – to consume gargantuan amounts of knowledge about anatomy, physiology, microbiology and how it all goes wrong, when it comes to your down time, you can’t just switch that off.
There’s no way to know all you need to know between 9am and 5pm, and then just un-know it until you need it again the following morning. Knowing everything that can and could go wrong is perhaps one of the plethora of reasons why medical staff – human and veterinary – suffer from stress the way they do.
Can’t help but think about…
To put this into context for you, I am a lover of fluffy breeds and, aside from empathising with them a little over the hotter months, I didn’t ever think too much about them in the way of anything remotely pathological.
Now, though, I can’t help but catch a glimpse of what is undoubtedly a very well-cared for animal without thinking about the dermatitis, the ear mites, the conjunctivitis…
I don’t want to be thinking about that, I can assure you. I’d much rather be thinking about the adorable dog I’ve just witnessed – but take it from me, it’s a really hard thing not to do; much like being told not to think about elephants and then finding yourself only thinking about elephants.
Wealth of knowledge
Don’t get me wrong; I love having this ever-growing pool of information at my fingertips. But is the knowledge of every disease or parasite I could ever contract slightly stressful? Yes. Is the act of learning all of these also somewhat stressful? Also yes.
But learning all this is half the reason any of us decided to become vets, doctors, nurses and so on in the first place. There’s a lot of good that can be done with it. For starters, I was completely unaware of the medical issues surrounding brachycephalic breeds until my first year on the vet course. If vets don’t know the worst that could happen, how can they advise owners on how to prevent or manage it?
One of the greatest responsibilities of medical practitioners is to educate; to pass the knowledge on. It will be a part of your life in a much wider capacity than just your career, so it’s not something to be scared of, but taken advantage of.
For those, like myself, who started off wanting to be a vet from a very young age, it was most likely with the sweetest of intentions: wanting to take care of animals (particularly the cute ones), wanting to help people – just wanting to make everything okay.
More than a decade on, I’d like to think those are still three solid goals I’ll carry with me throughout my career. But as my journey towards that career continues, I’m beginning to learn not all problems have an easy solution and, a lot of the time, you have to choose your professional opinion over your personal one.
Sense of community
Since I first stepped foot on a dairy farm, I’ve fancied myself as a farm vet. This was initially fuelled by a new found love of cows, but, over time, was reinforced by a fondness for the farming community and respect for those who worked within it. When I discovered that, despite the profession being largely dominated by women, most vets within the agricultural sector are male, I think it just spurred me on more.
Though I may still choose to pursue this path some day, my concept of what it means to be a farm vet has drastically changed over the past two years of my vet course.
I’ve touched on the fact before that treating working animals is a far cry from small animal practice. Of course, we’re still driven by the same desire to protect animal welfare, comfort and respect; but when you’re dealing with animals that are part of somebody’s livelihood (which are essentially an asset of a business) you also have to juggle costs and efficiency – and, in some cases, make a hard choice you wouldn’t have to make if the animal in front of you was, say, a golden retriever.
Weighing the options
That’s not to say evaluating costs isn’t a regular part of small animal practice. In my local practice I’ve seen more than a few cases where owners are forced to have their pets euthanised because they simply couldn’t afford the treatment.
It’s also a matter of thinking what’s best for the animal, even if the owners do have the funds. Chemotherapy, for example, is incredibly expensive. If an owner wants to opt for this treatment, the first opinion vet must still consider whether the animal would ultimately benefit or suffer from the treatment, even if life was prolonged.
Do the right thing
Judging quality of life is a job that spans the medical fields of both humans and animals. The difference is vets have the legal right to euthanise when they feel the suffering outweighs the good.
This, I think, will always be the ultimate battle between head and heart for any vet – the inherent will to prolong and protect life, weighed up with the knowledge of what, in that specific situation, is the right thing to do.
