Area of study in vet school?

[Thylacine]

My grandfather lives on a farm and he keeps pressuring me to work with dairy cattle. I have zero interest in working with livestock, so I don't plan to but I was curious to hear if anyone knows if the following is true. He says that there is a huge demand for dairy cattle veterinarians, so much so that some dairy organizations are willing to pay a student's way through veterinary school if they agree to work for them for a given number of years after graduation.

On another slightly unrelated note I was also wondering, do schools give any priority to applicants that express an interest in an emphasis other than small animals or equine? Those seem to be by far the most popular choices for applications. Do schools try at all to increase their numbers in the other areas of study?

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[jtom]

This has been debated more than a few times on here. Most will say that there is no preference for applicants with interest in food animal and that there are no actual food animal veterinarian shortages. I personally believe some schools will give more attention to an applicant with expressed interest in food animal if you can back it up with experiences. I have been on one interview so far and had several admission committee members tell me I will get extra "points" for wanting to do food animal. I think each school likes to have a certain number of food animal students so if your interest is food animal and few applicants have this desire, you Might have an advantage. However, your file still has to be competitive, an expressed interest even with experience to back it up will not lift a poor file (low GPA/GRE).

I do have an interest in food animal and currently am a tech at a mixed animal clinic and a dairy farm. I absolutely love dairy medicine and would love to work there full time. I am not sure about dairy farms paying back graduates to work for them but there are government loan forgiveness programs available if graduates serve in rural areas lacking veterinarians. However, I read that those programs have no funding so there is no real program.

 

[katryn]

The loan forgiveness programs are out there, but from what I hear, they are excessively competitive to get into, and there are a very limited number of spots. A private practice might be willing to pay back your loans (and pay you a salary at the same time), but I have never actually heard of this happening to anyone.

As for the "shortage" of LA vets, it has more to do with the difficulty of making a living in an area that doesn't necessarily have enough business to support a vet. If there aren't enough clients in an area to support a practice, there is no practice, and this lack of service is seen as a shortage even though there are plenty of vets out there who would be happy to work LA.

 

[PetPony]

I went to a lecture at the UGA vet school that a few veterinarians also attended. It was about the dairy industry. There were a few people saying that the demand for dairy cattle veterinarians may be going down in the future. Dairy farm workers apparently learn to do more and more procedures themselves and the vets aren't needed as much anymore as they used to be. The thought that would only progress even more in the future and that the demand would decrease more and more.

 

[Thylacine]

Dairy farm workers apparently learn to do more and more procedures themselves and the vets aren't needed as much anymore as they used to be.

That sounds a bit scary. Someone that is actually trained in the field of veterinary medicine is much less likely to make mistakes at the expensive of the animal. I hope there's more legal protection for livestock animals than I think there is.

 

[lostbunny]

That sounds a bit scary. Someone that is actually trained in the field of veterinary medicine is much less likely to make mistakes at the expensive of the animal. I hope there's more legal protection for livestock animals than I think there is.

Not necessarily- its not simply some monkey who just milks the cows one day is asked to pull a calf.

I worked at a cattle farm that was 2.5h from the nearest vet services, and the entire property was virtually inaccessible in a flood. Its just not feasible to call out a vet for every procedure (vaccinating, de horning, castrating, even pulling a calf sometimes) since it would probably cost more to get the vet out then to DIY, and if you can confidently do it yourself then perhaps its more humane to do it on your own then to wait X hours until the vet can get in IF they can even get in.

A LA vet I know once told me that especially in dairy, if the vet is called in then its not just bad its *really* bad.

 

[PrettyPenguins]

Well, in my area of the country LA specific vets are hard to come by, and if you find one, they usually don't know what they are doing. Most LA vets are also SA vets, and though their practice is SA based they have background in LA medicine. But as stated above most of the farms around here are in places where it is not convenient to put any type of animal practice around, because the demand isn't high. Most of our farmers are stubborn and will take care of things if the situation isn't too bad.

 

[jtom]

At the dairy I work at there is a vet on staff but he does not do much, he is more of a manager than anything else. The technicians do all the treatments and there is one very experienced technician that does c-sections, repairs DA's, and other surgeries. The vet only helps when they are backed up and I have yet to see him actually help out with anything. So yes, I do agree in the future that dairy farms will have less need for veterinarians.

 

[deleted387118]

I agree pretty much with what everyone has said, I just want to add a couple things.

When I was applying, I was told that my food animal hours from living on a farm are important because of the fact that most farmers do so much veterinary medicine. - which tells me that producers doing more on their own is nothing new and pretty universal. Is this good or bad? I think right now its too much of a necessity so even if it is bad (which I'm personally still on the fence about) its not going to change.

I also just ask that even if you have ZERO interest in food animal, get some experience with the current issues going on in the industry while in vet school. As a small animal practitioner, people will still ask you what you think about horse slaughter, caged hens, organic beef/pork, etc. It will still be part of your job to educate them on these important animal welfare topics.

 

[LetItSnow]

Well, in my area of the country LA specific vets are hard to come by, and if you find one, they usually don't know what they are doing.

And you're qualified to make that judgment..... how?