Here is a pict from last Thursday (June 18, 2009). I was injecting lidocaine into a baby pig's testicles (which was all the anesthesia he got for his castration).
The day was so much fun! We tackled cattle, wresseled a boar, played with puppies, collected ticks. One client even had bunnies! (Although they were for food. Sad.) It was a very interesting time traveling around the island searching for places and animals, getting lost. Much better than being trapped in the clinic!
It's my last Mid Semester Break. Usually I'm off trekking up a volcano or lounging on the beach. This time I'll be stuck in the library cramming for the Large Animal Surgery midterm. I've been too busy to study since we've gotten our sheep, donkey, and rotations.
My sheep and donkey are wonderful though. I'm going to try to get pictures of them. I would have gotten them already but we're not allowed to take pictures on campus (on threat of dismissal).
Sheep #50 "Coconut" is a standard Barbados Black Belly ram with a tan body and black legs. He has a splash of white on either side of his body. His favorite past times are eating sheep pellets, eating sugar cane grass, and eating more sheep pellets. He is full of snuggles and love. He knows all of us-- our group consists of two 6th semester students (Shannon and Jean) and two 7th semester students (Vanessa and I). He weighs about 62 lbs in the mornings and is under 1 year of age. He knows his name and comes running when he hears it. I got him a very pretty new blue collar. We're all so attached to him it's so pathetic. He is a fast learner and very good sheep.
Donkey #60 "Jake" is a sweetheart of a Mini? Island Donkey. He always has a good attitude, except when we're about to jab him in the neck with needles for blood. His feet were terrible, so when he was under general anesthesia, Vanessa and I trimmed them. His hooves now look spectacular! He no longer kicks, although he did bite the cr*p out of Vanessa's left shoulder Tuesday. I was able to easily get a catheter in his jugular vein. The fly mask I got him is too small for his big ol' head. He's about 5 years old, has a chocolate fuzzy body with a white nose. He most enjoys eating carrots, eating rice crispies, and eating green grass while being groomed. He has a dark green halter. He's the best donkey in the pasture, and we love him and his long hee-haw ears.
Okay, since I'm obviously not studying right now, I'd better stop writing and force myself to learn.
First of all, Happy Father's Day to my DAD! (I already spoke to him earlier.)
My mother decided to go look at the Starr Valley Ranch place today. She was not thrilled that I would be living in a trailer. It's a 2 bedroom 1 bath, with nice snap down wood floors.
She was actually pretty set against it until she went to look at another mobile home... which was apparently a disaster. 
I was able to convince her to go back and look at the 1st trailer again and to have her ask if I could only lease it thru December 31st since she was so displeased with it's appearance. 
My mother haggled the rent down from $450 to $425 per month for the trailer! My rent here is $550 or $575? So I'm pretty content with my new home! Knock on wood that it works out.
I've finally found a place to live in Stillwater!!! I am SO excited! I'll be living in a 2 bed 1 bath mobile home... or was it 3 bed 2 bath? I can't remember, but that's not important anyway! (Google Earth is so awesome!)
What IS important is that it allows dogs! I've found tons of places (well, not quite tons) that would let me keep horses, but when I'm ready to sign they tell me no dogs! I can't exactly get rid of Salty and Rudder (nor would I for a place to live). Anyway, it's been absurd.
I sent Sean up to look at places last weekend. Most were rented by the time he got up there, but there was this one little mobile home (ugly on the outside, fabulous on the inside) on 10 acres about 12 miles from campus. When he was uploading the picts to me of the place, a girl came by (with three horses) and gave the guy a deposit on the place! I was so upset, but things happen for a reason and it wasn't perfect. That place was too secluded and would have made me a little nervous at night.
Well, with the ER week, I had lost valuable time in finding a place. I spent hours calling people this week and finding out that nothing was available. Panic started to set in! I regrouped and called the various barns in town that I'd previously called. One guy called me back and I'd reminded him we'd discussed me wanting to rent a horse pasture since it was looking like I was going to be in an awful little apartment. He asked if I was looking for a place for me or my horses, and I said well, both. Then he told me he had a nice little trailer that just became available!!!
He said it had all appliances, was on a black top road (ie not dirt like the other ones), and had enough room in the yard for the dogs! Then I asked the dreaded question which so many people had said no to, if I could bring them inside? He said sure you can, the back door opens up right out into the yard, so as long as you put up a pen, the dogs can go in and out! Yippee!!! (My goal is to let the dogs stay outside during the day and inside at night.)
Then he told me
that he no longer had the 2 acre pasture, but instead he had a 5-6 acre pasture with a barn! (I was nearly jumping up and down at this point!!!) He then added that I would be able to use the arena and round pen too! How perfect! Not that I'll ever have time to ride or anything, but I'm so excited!
Knowing what I know now about finding the perfect place in
Stillwater, I told him I'd take it! I'm sending either Sean, a classmate already in Stillwater, or my mother to go look at it today and then have a check in the mail to him on Monday. It's 5 miles from campus and very close to fast food!
It was always MY shift! I'm done with ER finally now. I can't believe I lived on so little sleep. So much for studying for my Large Animal Medicine exam this morning. I was in the ER all weekend (in addition to every night this week) and was only able to study for literally 2 hours before the exam started. Grades already posted though, I did good enough to be content with my grade.
The major excitement was Saturday night. A campus worker found his dog next to a dead sheep. He and his two student friends brought the dog in. I was there, supposed to be alone, but wasn't only because a student spay dog was bleeding half to death.
Okay, let me back up... this was at no fault to the student surgeons, as far as I know, but that dog was my drama the night before when I checked on her (30 min intervals) and found her cage filled with bight red blood (at 5am). So we (the two student surgeons I made haul themselves up to campus at 5:15am) dealt with that dog all day. Turns out routine spays are really dangerous and stressful surgeries! (Was like a repeat of last semester when our partner's dog would not clot due to low platelets.) At 11am, I was released to go home and sleep because I had to be back at 8pm for my next overnight shift.
Anyway, the dog by sheep arrived at 8:30pm (making it a very long day for all involved). He was foaming at the mouth (which would have been consistent with Rabies if we'd been in the states) and having seizures. His temperature was 108F!!! (Not compatible with life.) His heart sounded exactly like we learned about in Small Animal medicine: little kid playing on the drums. It was amazing, horribly irregular, tachycardia, and like nothing I'd ever hear before! To complicate matters, the dog stopped breathing, which is also not compatible with life.
So what does one do in this situation? Yeah I donno either. The vet was 20 minutes away and had alerted me before the dog arrived. So by this time the clients are shrieking at me, so I had to do something. We got ice packs for them to put around the dog, turned on the oxygen tank, and set up an IV fluid line. I'm not the person you'd want to have place a catheter without out pressure, now bring the pressure to it's max, and I'm really not who you'd want to place it. It was a blind stick too since the vein was almost collapsed. I took a deep breath and got it on the first try! I have NO idea how. Tomorrow I'm placing a jugular catheter in our little donkey, so I sure hope my skills don't leave me.
We bollused a shock dose of fluids into this dog, who was still seizing, then readjusted the ice packs. His body temperature was starting to come down, but his tongue was still indigo blue. All the meds were locked up (with good reason), so all we could do was wait. By the time the on-call vet arrived, the dog had a fever, but had stopped seizing, was pink rather than blue, and aware of his surroundings. Then I stepped back so they could give him activated charcoal to absorb whatever the toxin was.
Two hours after the dog arrived, he looked completely normal and was ready to fetch. The vet told the owner that in all his years, he had only ever seen one other animal with that high of a temperature survive. At that temperature, the proteins in the blood become solid (just like when you cook a steak). That night seven other dogs in the owner's neighborhood died. We think that the dogs had been let wander by their owners and they got a taste for sheep. The owner of the sheep got made and salted the carcase with a poison, most likely a Carbamate.
My last case was a dog bite wound on Sunday night. (Remember, my exam was Monday at 7am.) A 2nd semester student came in crying as the on-call vet and I were updating the ER club about the cases. I slipped out to see what she needed. Apparently a clinic dog (now an anatomy dog) attacked her. She had at least 8 bite wounds up and down her arms. There were another 6 or 7 on her legs, and she is a girl of my stature! Then she lifted up her pants and there was a gaping hole and the outline of all the dog's teeth on her left butt cheek! Poor girl. I don't have much sympathy for the dog just because it was such an obvious and repeated attack.
And that was my exciting weekend. I definitely learned more in that week than in a semester of classes, speaking of, have a long week of school ahead...
To say I had a very busy week is an understatement. I've been in the ER all week and will continue to be here thru Sunday evening. SIX dogs were in with Paraquat poisoning in one day, in addition to the normal hospital case load! One was euthanized yesterday and another is getting worse. Slow suffocation is not a good way to go. Very sad.
We had anesthesia duty for donkey surgery, which by chance, was relatively successful. The other days of the week were filled, with what, I can't remember, but I've been at school >18hrs/day for a while now. No biggie, it's still not as difficult as grad school.
I'm absolutely in love with my sheep. He's #50, but I call him Coconut. It was love at first sight. All the sheepies love me (grain bucket). It surprises me that some of my classmates still haven't figured this out. Oh well, my little Coconut baby come running when he hears me, and that's all that counts.
In my uber busy schedule, I haven'y had time to check my email. Here's a sample of what I recieved today:
Lost cell phone: "I lost my cell phone somewhere today. :( If anyone sees a cell phone lying around....in the grass somewhere or sitting on a pile of donkey poo....it is probably mine."
Missing cat: "None of us have seen her for the past week (which is unusual for her) until a few days ago when she ran off. She looked very sick. We set up a trap to catch her with no luck..."
Lost watch: "I forgot to grab my watch after I took it off to scrub in on Tue's epididectomy. If anyone picked it up please let me know."
Lost and found hoof pick: "Once again I think something has fallen out of my pocket. Hoof pick, red handle, tape on it that says "KN". I also FOUND a red hoof pick in the sheep barn. Let me know if it's yours."
Lost grocery sack: "I lost a white plastic groecery sack with a pair of scrubs, a lab coat, and a pair of pink and white Nike sneakers in it. If anybody has seen it please let me know."
Lost mind: "Lost my mind when I decided to go to vet school 2.5 years ago anyone sees it let me know."
The reply: "I saw it yesterday in the gutter."
I am not alone.
Source: AVMA June 1, 2009
"Tuskegee University School of Veterinary Medicine has been moved from limited to full accreditation until 2013. The decision, made by the AVMA Council on Education March 2-4 at AVMA headquarters in Schaumburg, Ill., was based on a focused site visit in December 2008.
According to an April 9 Tuskegee press release, the school was commended for its efforts in increasing the small animal and equine caseloads, implementing year-round clinical rotations, achieving higher pass rate scores for the national licensing examination, and committing to a diverse student body.
Five other U.S. schools were granted seven years of full accreditation after comprehensive site visit evaluations in fall 2008 and spring 2009. Twenty-two schools or colleges of veterinary medicine received continued accreditation status on the basis of their 2008 interim reports. Among them were 13 from the United States, two from Canada, two from Australia, and one each from Ireland, Scotland, England, New Zealand, and the Netherlands.
In addition, the COE agreed to a request from the University of Queensland School of Veterinary Science in Brisbane, Australia, to begin the accreditation process. Staff will contact the school to request potential dates for a consultative site visit in 2010.
The council denied requests from the Ross University School of Veterinary Medicine, St. Kitts, West Indies, and St. George's University School of Veterinary Medicine, Grenada, West Indies, to conduct comprehensive site visits. Consultative site visits were conducted at the schools in 2006 and 2007, respectively. Foreign colleges are granted comprehensive site visits when deficiencies noted during the consultative site visit have been fully addressed."
We got our sheep and donkey assignments today. I think my days of enjoying the island are officially over. We have to write a report 2x's a day, on top of the 10-12 hours we're in class.
How it makes sense to have 3 hours of class per day in some semesters, and more than 12 hours in this semester is beyond me. My postings might get more and more sparse as the semester drags on.
