Best schools for large animal medicine?

[MintyMoose]

So I'm very interested in large animal medicine, more livestock than equine but ideally, I want to practice both. This past cycle I applied to several schools including AVC, CSU/UAF, WSU, U of W Madison, OSU, tOSU, UPenn, MSU/SDSU, VMCVM, and Cornell. I live in the northeast and my state doesn't have a veterinary program, nor do we have any seats saved in any vet schools so regardless I will need to travel and be OOS. While I'm not sure what schools I will get accepted to, I want to see if anyone has any insight as to the quality of the LA program at these schools! The only one I know for sure that focuses on LA is the SDSU program. Any thoughts would be appreciated, thank you! 🙂

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[EB73674]

That sounds like a pretty good list to me - I can say from direct experience that you'll get a great caseload at Ohio State, and less-so-but-still-a-lot of livestock caseload at Penn (although their large animal caseload is all out at the New Bolton Center, which is about 45-60min from the main campus in Philadelphia).

 

[that redhead]

AVC had a pretty good combination of livestock (almost entirely dairy) and equine (standardbred racing is big there). A few camelids or small ruminants here and there but again mostly dairy on the island. Lots of dairy research happening there too!

 

[EngrSC]

Large animal internal medicine person here, though more equine focused. VMCVM has a decent large animal caseload between field service, production management medicine, and large animal medicine & surgery service. We’re also a tracking school (options are small animal, food animal, equine, public corporate, or mixed), so you can take more classes 3rd year and more rotations in clinical year with your species of interest. I really love the large animal internists here, and the hospital can support 2 LA medicine residents and 2 LA surgery residents at a time. Personally I don’t think I’d do a residency here because I think caseload is higher elsewhere, like at the Equine Medical Center in northern VA that is affiliated with Virginia Tech (but they only see equids). But I’ve been very happy with my education here 🙂

 

[JaynaAli]

Do you know what you’re wanting to do within large animal medicine? Not all large animal curricula are going to teach you the same things. A school like TAMU or OkSU will be heavy on beef cattle and western performance/rodeo horses with only rare patients that are dairy cows or English performance horses, while at NCSU or Cornell you might see more dairy cattle and racing/dressage/jumper horses. All the schools should provide you with an adequate education, but if you (might) know where you want to end up, that may influence where you go.

 

[MintyMoose]

That sounds like a pretty good list to me - I can say from direct experience that you'll get a great caseload at Ohio State, and less-so-but-still-a-lot of livestock caseload at Penn (although their large animal caseload is all out at the New Bolton Center, which is about 45-60min from the main campus in Philadelphia).

I visited Penn and I loved their large animal facility but was disappointed with how far it was from the main campus :-( Ohio is one of my top choices! Do you see any camelids there and are the cattle mostly beef or dairy?

 

[MintyMoose]

AVC had a pretty good combination of livestock (almost entirely dairy) and equine (standardbred racing is big there). A few camelids or small ruminants here and there but again mostly dairy on the island. Lots of dairy research happening there too!

That's awesome I love dairy! AVC doesn't have that much info and images online about their facility, they have a large animal hospital right?

 

[MintyMoose]

Do you know what you’re wanting to do within large animal medicine? Not all large animal curricula are going to teach you the same things. A school like TAMU or OkSU will be heavy on beef cattle and western performance/rodeo horses with only rare patients that are dairy cows or English performance horses, while at NCSU or Cornell you might see more dairy cattle and racing/dressage/jumper horses. All the schools should provide you with an adequate education, but if you (might) know where you want to end up, that may influence where you go.

Kind of torn actually 😬 I absolutely love dairy and English riding but I know in the future I plan on moving out west into the mountain states where it's overwhelmingly beef and western. Is there any good in between schools on my list or do they mostly swing one way or the other?

 

[that redhead]

That's awesome I love dairy! AVC doesn't have that much info and images online about their facility, they have a large animal hospital right?

They do have a large animal hospital (including CT), and they’re the primary tertiary referral center for all of Atlantic Canada. They also have solid farm service and equine ambulatory practices so plenty of rotations on-island. As for your comment re: beef, there are some beef operations on-island they serve as well. Happy to answer more questions as I’m able, I graduated in 2015.

 

[EB73674]

I visited Penn and I loved their large animal facility but was disappointed with how far it was from the main campus :-( Ohio is one of my top choices! Do you see any camelids there and are the cattle mostly beef or dairy?

I’d say it’s mostly an even mix of dairy vs beef, and yes we definitely get a decent camelid caseload! I’ve seen a number of alpacas getting treatment, plus plenty of goats, sheep, and swine in addition to cattle. We also have a great equine caseload that’s pretty varied between English, Western, and hobby/pet animals. And these are just the cases I’ve seen in the hospitals on main campus, the Marysville campus sees even more livestock cases both in their clinic & on field service. Midwest schools are definitely where it’s at for livestock!

 

[katiemcat]

UFCVM has a large animal hospital, and you have the opportunity to receive a certificate in large animal medicine 🙂

 

[MintyMoose]

They do have a large animal hospital (including CT), and they’re the primary tertiary referral center for all of Atlantic Canada. They also have solid farm service and equine ambulatory practices so plenty of rotations on-island. As for your comment re: beef, there are some beef operations on-island they serve as well. Happy to answer more questions as I’m able, I graduated in 2015.

That's awesome! Would I be able to PM you some questions regarding the school? Thanks 🙂

 

[that redhead]

That's awesome! Would I be able to PM you some questions regarding the school? Thanks 🙂

Sure!