Question about studying in veterinary school

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My biggest wonder about veterinary school is how anybody can study so many different types of animals in their 4 years and come out knowing anything about anything. In human medicine students study the human body and its variations. But in veterinary medicine, students are expected know about exotics, equine, small animal, and the huge array of zoological (which I guess are also exotic) animals.
How does this work? Do veterinary students recieve more education about more topics, but with less depth? Or is it all just crammed into a smaller time period?
I'm just curious.

 

[WhtsThFrequency]

Or is it all just crammed into a smaller time period?

Yes 😀 The goal of veterinary school is to graduate someone who has enough knowledge to be successful in any field: small animal, food animal, equine, what have you. You are required to have detailed knowledge, although not "extreme detailed" - but you by no means come out mediocre in any field. In terms of what I meant when I said "extreme detail" - you do, as you progress in your studies, have to opportunity to take more directed electives, or in the case of tracking schools, "track" courses if (i.e. I am a Public/Corporate Track, and can take Advanced Histopathology while Small Animal trackers take Small Animal Theriogenology, but we all have to take General Theriogenology which covers all species in pretty good detail, and General Histology which again covers everything). So yes, the is opportunity to specialize, but not at the expense of becoming only "half-knowledgeable" in other fields.

 

[Electrophile]

My biggest wonder about veterinary school is how anybody can study so many different types of animals in their 4 years and come out knowing anything about anything.

Haha, I wonder this every day. Graduate school is a mile deep and an inch wide. Medical and vet school is a mile wide and an inch deep. I've probably been force fed more info on more crap in 5 months than 3 years of graduate school. 🙄

 

[WhtsThFrequency]

I've probably been force fed more info on more crap in 5 months than 3 years of graduate school

What, you mean you don't want to know ten different heat synchronization programs for dairy herds? What's wrong with you? 😕

 

[Hollycozza]

so much learned and so much forgotten

 

[laurafinn]

A lot of mammalian physiology is similar, thank god. But yes, much learned, much forgotten 🙂 Like how many fingers and toes each different kind of major rodent has... um, yeah.

 

[Catch91]

This is precisely the reason for the argument that vet school is harder than med school. Obviously, in medical school, you study the human body. In vet school, you study the bodies (and other workings, obviously) of a variety of animals. So, in essence, it can be about twice as hard, or more!

 

[dvm'08]

This is precisely the reason for the argument that vet school is harder than med school. Obviously, in medical school, you study the human body. In vet school, you study the bodies (and other workings, obviously) of a variety of animals. So, in essence, it can be about twice as hard, or more!

i think this is garbage. and it really irritates me when vet students think they have it harder than our human counter parts. I'm sure medical school is just as difficult as vet school, as in many cases they learn twice (if not more) the detail about many diseases afflicting humans.... so although in some areas they may not have the species volume we do, they surely have the specificity and depth in areas we do not.

 

[banditalfi]

i think this is garbage. and it really irritates me when vet students think they have it harder than our human counter parts. I'm sure medical school is just as difficult as vet school, as in many cases they learn twice (if not more) the detail about many diseases afflicting humans.... so although in some areas they may not have the species volume we do, they surely have the specificity and depth in areas we do not.

The other thing to consider is that there are a certain areas of human medicine that are just not feasible to do on animals considering the cost of the procedure, length of recovery, lifespan of the animal and/or lack of funding to actually make the procedure happen in animal x (I'm talking research wise)

 

[Serendipity4]

If I were to weigh in here, I'd say that vets don't go into quite as much as detail about everything as human doctors. That said, say vets learn about 5 species (random number, I assure you), and MDs learn about 1. I wouldn't say that means that vets learn 20% of the depth as MDs, and 5 times the species. I'm pretty sure the percentage of depth, if you will, is quite a bit higher. So how is it possible? Because, as some have said, there is quite a bit of repetition amongst species. I'd say the toughest part is learning any piece of information about your first species; after that you have some frame of reference and the rest of the species are easier to learn about.

Basically, I'm pretty sure that neither vets nor MDs are sitting around in class, being lazy (okay, maybe some of us are, but we make up for it the night before our tests! 😉). And I'm pretty sure that the vast majority of med students who do well in med school could do well in vet school (if they were passionate about animals, since it's easier to learn about that which you're passionate), just like I think the vast majority of vet students who do well in vet school could do well in med school (again, if they were passionate about human medicine).