1/8th a doctor!

Now that exams are over and final grades have been posted, I can officially say that I have passed my first semester of veterinary school. I am now 1/8th a veterinarian! It was a pretty intense set of exams starting with Physiology on Monday, a cumulative anatomy exam Tuesday, and a cumulative Histology exam yesterday. I passed my surgery class, but will have to go in this coming spring semester to re-demonstrate my intradermal, vertical mattress and vessel ligation before performing junior surgery in my third year. But before that, I have three whole weeks OFF! No work, no school, just play!

I will be driving down to Las Vegas December 19th to spend the week with the family for Christmas. Burton gets to go too! I am so looking forward to spending time with my mom, dad, brother, sister-in-law and Nona and Papa! I will then be going to Reno on December 29th for New Years where I will get to see all my Reno friends! Now that the pressure from school is off, I can finally relax and be excited to enjoy the holiday.

Next semester is already shaping up to be jam packed with another set of intensive courses. In addition to our regular coursework, we are required to participate in a practicum course that involves experiential learning. There were several practica available to enroll in, and my first choice was to serve as an ambassador for the USU SVM for one year. 16 of my classmates (myself included) signed up for the six positions available. The students were selected by WSU this week, and I was one of the six chosen! I will serve starting this spring semester through the year of 2013 by giving tours and information to interviewees for the next incoming class to the USU SVM, as well as students interested in enrolling in the next application cycle. I was the only out of state student chosen to be an ambassador as well. There is also an elective class available that I am contemplating taking called skeleton preparation. You can imagine what that entails! As far as our regular required coursework, I will be taking immunology, pathology, anatomy II, physiology II, and nutrition.

I hope everyone has been well and I look forward to seeing everyone soon!

A meme one of my classmates created of our histology professor. His lectures are very fast paced...just a little taste of what veterinary school feels like!

This picture does not do the colors justice. Utah has beautiful sunsets!

Roxy is very helpful when I am trying to study anatomy...

Me and my anatomy group being silly during our last night in the lab!

Burton and I go for walks in the field behind our house. Lots of open room to play!

Thanksgiving Break!

Thanksgiving Break is finally here!!! We get a whole week off from classes next week. (Which will be SO nice...I feel like I've been going and going and going) When we return from break, we will have two more full weeks of classes, then three days of finals. Then I will be 1/8th of the way done with veterinary school!

My most recent adventure was a trip to Salt Lake City last weekend to go to the Hogle Zoo. A group of us were able to meet with the zoo veterinarian and tour their hospital and veterinary facilities. I don't have a lot of interest in being a zoo vet (I think it would be cool, but there are so many other things I'm more interested in) but it was a great experience! The animals were very active in the colder weather! The snow leopard cub was running around and playing with his mom's tail, and there were several young animals to see.

The month and half old giraffe calf at Hogle Zoo in Salt Lake City

Classes have been continuing to go very well. In the last few weeks, several of our classes have drawn all the concepts we've been learning about together. It has been really refreshing to finally see how all of the minute details we've studied actually fit into the big picture and how they will fit into practice. Our anatomy lab today was practicing auscultation on dogs and cats. Burton attended his very first day of vet school so that he could be a part of lab and have his lungs and ticker listened to.

My classmate Colton listening to Burton's heart and lung sounds while I hold.

We have had a few snow storms come through the valley. This area is very beautiful when it snows! And it gets pretty chilly here. In the mornings, it's been about 20 degrees. And supposedly, this fall and winter (so far) have been pretty mild...

Burton playing around in the snow. We got about 5-6 inches at our house at the last storm!

Snow on the last of the fall leaves in Logan

The view of the snow-capped mountains from our house in Hyrum.

Ryann and I are starting the break off tomorrow night by going down to Salt Lake City to see Eric Church in concert at the Maverick Center! Then I will head to Las Vegas on Tuesday evening and spend the rest of the week there. I can't believe Christmas is right around the corner again. Ryann and I have tentative plans to try to go up to Denver for a few days. I believe I will be in Las Vegas for a few days to celebrate Christmas. And I am hoping to be in Reno for New Years. Then the next semester starts January 7th with a very packed schedule!

I hope everyone is doing well and has a wonderful holiday next week!

Cheers

C

Buffalo Soldier

Hey all! I can finally come out of my hole from studying now that midterms are over! All of my grades so far have been good. I am doing well in all of my classes and while the information just keeps coming, the good news is that I am absorbing and understanding it all and am finding more and more often how it can be applied!

A few more exciting things have happened since my last entry: I was recently notified that I received the William B. Gasman Scholarship from WSU! I am very appreciative of this award!

I also had a unique experience just this afternoon. Me and a group of my classmates drove out to Antelope Island. It is one of the Utah State Parks, and is an island located in the middle of the Great Salt Lake. While the island was named for the pronghorn antelope that used to inhabit it, it is currently the home to approximately 700 bison. Once a year, the bison are rounded up for routine vaccination, blood draws, and pregnancy diagnosis. We were able to observe a local veterinarian who is commissioned to oversee and perform these procedures and get a little hands-on experience ourselves! I was able to pregnancy diagnose three bison (all of which were pregnant!). Pregnancy diagnosis involves rectal palpation of the dorsal aspect of the uterus. When a dam is pregnant, structures called cotyledons are present (for nutrient exchange between the dam and the fetus). These cotyledons are palpable in many large animal species and are usually the quick and dirty way (no pun intended) to determine if the dam is pregnant. While we were out on the island we took a few pictures and had a lot of fun!

The view of  the mountains from Antelope Island

Me pregnancy diagnosing a bison cow!

Bison calves waiting to go into the chute for blood draws

Bison bull grazing on Antelope Island

Halloween was pretty mild since our last midterm was that morning. I didn't even have a chance to plan out a costume and dress up. But it was pretty enjoyable to sit down with my awesome roommates for a bowl of homemade chili, a bottle of wine and a scary movie while we passed out candy to the neighborhood kiddos.

I know I am busy as always, but I hope everyone is doing well! I think about my family and friends often and look forward to the next time I see everyone! Of course, please call or text! I love to hear from you all!

Till next time!

xoxo
C

Exciting News

The end of this last week was an eventful one! As usual, each week goes by so quickly, and now I can hardly believe the weekend is almost over!

Our class held elections for our class leaders on Friday, and my classmates nominated and elected me for Vice President! I am very honored to be recognized as a leader to represent my class! I have a lot of ideas to shape our new school and now I am in a position to implement some of them. I feel that the leadership our class elected has an excellent dynamic (just like our class). This is a four year position as well!

On Thursday, the final exam was held for the elective class I was taking (International Veterinary Medicine). Our grades were posted the next day and I passed the class with an 87 on the exam! Woo hoo! I will also be finishing another class this week with a final paper due tomorrow morning!

With all of the studying and time spent in class it's pretty difficult to get a chance to go out and see the scenery, but I have had the chance to sneak off into Logan Canyon and check out the fall colors. The leaves started changing about two or three weeks ago in the canyon and have started changing here in the valley within the last week and a half. The brilliant colors are very stunning!

(Tony Grove in Logan Canyon, UT)

This week will mostly be preparation for the next round of midterms. About half of my classes have a few tests and quizzes throughout the semester, but a few (like the ones I mentioned above) ride on only one exam at the end of the course. One other class that is formatted this way is my Principles of Surgery class. Before starting our Junior year of instruction, we have to pass an examination that proves that we are competent at skills essential to surgery. In order to better prepare us for this test, we take this Principles of Surgery course our first semester of freshman year. At the end of the course we are given two hours to complete a list of tasks (i.e. different suture patters, tying knots, scrubbing, gloving and gowning, correctly identifying surgical instruments and properly performing a variety of sterile techniques). We must perfectly pass the test in order to pass the class. If for any reason we fail the test, we are given a second chance next fall to try to pass the test again before moving up to WA. It has been a lot of fun practicing applicable techniques! I am gaining a lot of confidence in my surgical capabilities each time I practice!

(practice cruciate sutures on my suture block by yours truly)

(All sterile after scrubbing and sterile gloving and gowning)

Hope all is well with everyone! Cheers from UT!

xoxo

C

Six Weeks In

Hi family and friends! I've decided to start a blog about my adventures during veterinary school. It has been difficult to keep up with everyone since school started this August. And as I'm sure you know, my relationships are very important to me. So I'm trying out this whole blog thing out to try to keep everyone in the loop!

I am alive! It has been quite a transition even from graduate school into veterinary school! I am thinking I should start more towards the beginning of this adventure...

I was invited to attend Utah State University's (USU) inaugural class for the new School of Veterinary Medicine (SVM) in conjunction with Washington State University's (WSU) College of Veterinary Medicine (CVM). My first two years of school start out in Logan, UT about an hour and a half northeast of Salt Lake City, UT. My second two years of school will be in Pullman, WA. My degree (Doctorate of Veterinary Medicine or DVM) will be from WSU. This so far has been quite the adventure. Sometimes, I really do feel like the guinea pig because there are still glitches that need to be worked out. A handful of our courses are being taught via distance education. With all this new technology, we can sit in on classes (using webcams and microphones) that are occurring hundreds of miles away up at WSU and vice versa. Buuuuut that's definitely been one of the guinea pig situations. Though the staff is working as hard as they can to get the technology to work, we have missed out on a few lectures and media. I'm still pretty impressed that we now have the capability to do this though! We even have club meetings with WSU.

My class load is pretty heavy. I am taking Physiology, Histology, Anatomy, Ag Animal Handling, Principles of Surgery, Animals Veterinarians and Society and International Veterinary Medicine (elective). Classes are M-F with lecture/lab from 8am-12:30 or 2 pm then lab out at the university farm from 2:30-4:30 or 6. Then of course I have to study after I get out of class. Each course goes through about a semester's worth of material in about a week, so it has been quite the learning curve to adjust to the pace. But it has been exciting to start learning the clinical relevance of the material we learn every day. For example, during anatomy, we also have palpation labs where we learn bony prominences and important anatomical landmarks for practice on live animals (most palpations have been on dogs, cats and horses)! A lot of this first year focuses on what is or should be 'normal' in large and small animal species

One of the perks to coming to school here at USU is because this class has just started out, there are only 30 individuals. 20 of my classmates are residents of UT. Me and the remaining nine are attending as nonresidents. Five of us are from the state of NV! So I was fortunate enough to start already knowing a handful of my fellow classmates, two of whom I arranged to live with. Together we are renting a house in Hyrum--one of the farm towns just south of Logan. We have a nice 4 bedroom house on the end of a dead end to the block with a large backyard, and plenty of space for the animals we brought along. One of my roommates and really close friends, Ryann, brought along her dog, Seth. He is a brown-spotted Dalmation and is Burton's best friend! And of course I brought Burton and Roxy along for the ride as well!

Currently I am studying for the second round of midterms coming up at the very end of October. I will get a full week off from class to celebrate Thanksgiving, then return for only a few weeks and then it will be finals time. It's been very hard to believe how quickly the time goes. Unfortunately, I always feel behind, and that kind of stress is difficult. A lot of recent research has shown the benefit of having counselors for veterinary students throughout school. So I have taken advantage of the psychologist provided just for the veterinary students. He has been a great person to talk to to work through the emotions and stresses of this type of profession.

I could talk forever and ever about how much I'm learning, how much fun I'm having and how stressed out I am, but I don't have time and this entry is already longer than I really wanted it to be, so I'll leave you all with that. Please don't hesitate to call, text or email. I likely won't be able to respond immediately, but it means so much to know I have support. I will try to update this frequently!

Lots of love! xoxoxox
C