Veterinary Parasite

Ah, the joys of farm reproduction - a morning spent with an arm up a cow’s arse, followed by an afternoon watching a caesarean video…what could be better?  Well, lots of things do actually spring to mind, but as far as good practical experience goes, then this week has been excellent so far.  Admittedly there has only been one day so far!

One thing that really strikes me is how important the early years of anatomy and physiology really are.  Of course this is true in all areas of veterinary science, but reproduction really brings it together.  The anatomy of the reproductive tract is basic first year knowledge, long forgotten, but when you’re feeling mush in the back end of a cow, its importance suddenly hits home.  After a fair while of mindless groping, I’m “reasonably” certain I could feel uterus and ovaries, but I wouldn’t be putting any money on it!  A quick look over some anatomy notes tonight, however, and I can go into tomorrow 23.4 (approximately) times more confident!

The part which I really find satisfying is our therapeutic interventions, i.e. manipulating the oestrous cycle.  At first it can seem pretty complex - when should I give progesterone? How about prostaglandin? Why not GnRH?  As usual though, thinking back to second year reproductive physiology reveals the answers.   Simple questions, such as what would normally produce that hormone, at what time in the oestrous cycle, and what are its effects, are all that is needed to see the logic behind each treatment, and quickly build up a picture of what is appropriate and when.

All combined, it makes reproduction and interesting topic - it requires both knowledge of cold hard facts, but also an understanding of them, tied together with a knowledge of the drugs we have available to us, and how we can use them.  Most satisfying of all, it’s an area where a vet can really make a difference to a farm, even to the point of swinging it from a non-viable enterprise into a profitable one (hopefully not vice versa!), and knowing this makes it a really enjoyable way to spend your time!

Bloody hell this blogging lark is harder than it’s cracked up to be!  I came into it thinking I’d whip out a post once a day no problems, but then something comes along to eat every second of your time!  In this case, the time eater was the indubitable pleasure of equine out of hours week.  After starting with a 44 hour out of 48 weekend, work then continued at a mere 16 or so hours a day, so quite relaxing really.  Strangely, this meant that I spent every hour away from the hospital asleep, rather than blogging!

An unexpected nice side effect was getting to see lots of sunrises over the hospital, as well as some truly stunning night skies.  Being an idiot, I obviously didn’t have a camera with me, but I managed to snap one nice sunrise, complete with vapour trails, on my phone, so I present it here for your delectation!

Sunrise Over The Equine Hospital

This week I start with my farm rotations, commencing with herd health planning.  Today was a nice day out in the sunshine, blighted only by the task of getting a condition, lameness and cleanliness score, along with size, yield and rumen fill for over 100 cows!  Still, that’s the data collection phase over, time to see what magic I can work using the power of statistics!

The last five days has flown by, and the first week of my clinical rotations is over! I suppose this effectively means I now know all I need to know about diagnostic imaging of horses…which is a little concerning really. Well, at least I can safely say I know a lot more now than 5 days ago!

Next week is Equine Practice, our first opinion week. Looking forward to it all round, as I can see myself doing this when I graduate. Also, it’s an easy going week, and we get to do a presentation to the rest of the equine people at the end of the week - and I’m one of those people who loves doing publix speaking type things!