Recommendation for rotating internships for a future GP

[ExoticsandWildlifevet]

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Hi! I’m a third-year vet student currently looking for rotating internship programs, specifically private practices with high case loads. My ultimate goal is to pursue general practice with some emergency work before eventually opening a clinic in my community. I’m considering a few options so far, including AMC and Wheat Ridge, but I’d love to hear from anyone who has experience with these programs—or any other recommendations you may have. I’m open to programs across the U.S., and while I’d love a Florida-based internship, it’s not a dealbreaker at all! I’m trying to learn as much as possible. Thank you for any suggestions or insights!

 

[JaynaAli]

My honest opinion is you shouldn’t bother doing an internship if you’re not going to specialize. A GP position with good mentorship is going to teach you infinitely more about being a GP and a clinic owner than an internship ever will. Will an internship make you more adept/confident at handling complicated emergencies, intense hospitalizations, and specialty cases? Sure, but that’s such a small, small portion of what you’d do as a GP it’s not worth the year of low pay and poor work conditions as an intern.

My internship was at a small private specialty hospital (back in 2015-2016, basically the dark ages) and they let us rotate through a sister GP clinic two weeks of the year and I felt so out of my element because it was not what I’d been training for at all. Like…eyeballs? Vaccines? Parasite prevention? A spay through a keyhole incision and not fully unzippered stem to stern? What is this.

 

[MixedAnimals77]

As a gp who does rural gp with er work (albeit not like vents and stuff-like some things just need referred) don't do an intership. It's a different skill set builder and alot less pay for way more hours and stress. You can find good places with good mentorship for both. Many of us transition gp to er and er to gp without more formal training. Happy to chat more- we do gdvs and diaphraghmatic hernia repairs and hospitalize the super sick-parvo,cluster seizures, pancreatitis,etc. I've done tons of abdominal and thoracocentesis and even a pericardialcentesis.
Don't get me wrong I am so thankful for speciality and it serves a great roll and I learned a ton of what is possible at the gold standard level so I can offer that for all patients but it's a different skill set for sure

 

[ExoticsandWildlifevet]

My thoughts behind it is if I can do a rotating internship and get experience with specialist in dermatology, dentistry, optho, diagnostic imaging, ect…I’d be able to get knowledge from specialist id incorporate into my practice. But I wonder if working in a multi-vet practice could give me similar exposure. I’ve only worked for a one vet clinic and the GP was very old school. It was antibiotics and steroids for everyone. No cytologies, no fundic exams, etc…I don’t mind being overworked and underpaid for a year if it will help me reach my long-term goals. While I agree I may feel a bit out of my element when I transition back to GP, I think I’ll pick it up quickly, and I’ll have the added benefit of experience with more complicated cases and working under specialist. Most of my clientele would to be able to afford seeing a specialist so it would benefit them, the patient and my business. My end goal is to open my own clinic in 3-4 years max, so after the internship, I’d focus on GP full-time and take on ER shifts for more experience and extra income.

 

[pp9]

Hi! I’m a third-year vet student currently looking for rotating internship programs, specifically private practices with high case loads. My ultimate goal is to pursue general practice with some emergency work before eventually opening a clinic in my community. I’m considering a few options so far, including AMC and Wheat Ridge, but I’d love to hear from anyone who has experience with these programs—or any other recommendations you may have. I’m open to programs across the U.S., and while I’d love a Florida-based internship, it’s not a dealbreaker at all! I’m trying to learn as much as possible. Thank you for any suggestions or insights!

My thoughts behind it is if I can do a rotating internship and get experience with specialist in dermatology, dentistry, optho, diagnostic imaging, ect…I’d be able to get knowledge from specialist id incorporate into my practice. But I wonder if working in a multi-vet practice could give me similar exposure. I’ve only worked for a one vet clinic and the GP was very old school. It was antibiotics and steroids for everyone. No cytologies, no fundic exams, etc…I don’t mind being overworked and underpaid for a year if it will help me reach my long-term goals. While I agree I may feel a bit out of my element when I transition back to GP, I think I’ll pick it up quickly, and I’ll have the added benefit of experience with more complicated cases and working under specialist. Most of my clientele would to be able to afford seeing a specialist so it would benefit them, the patient and my business. My end goal is to open my own clinic in 3-4 years max, so after the internship, I’d focus on GP full-time and take on ER shifts for more experience and extra income.

I generally recommend internships for those wanting to go into ER full time, but I also I agree with what Jayna and Mix have said. If I was set on going into GP, I would not have done my internship.

The level of cases you'll see at a specialty hospital are often (and supposed to be) out of the scope of what a GP has resources to handle. That's why 24 hour ERs and specialists exist. At the end of my intern year, I scrubbed in on who knows how many septic abdomens, cholies, nephrectomies, etc. Watched hundreds of echos, assisted during many phacos, and so on. If I were going into GP, probably 80+% of what I did that year would not have substantially contributed to the skills I'd need for GP, and the biggest learning point would have been when/what to refer. I think that is valuable knowledge, but would not be worth the lost pay/time to many. Given what you've stated here, it would be far more beneficial for you to go into a really mentorship-heavy GP clinic and take surgical/ultrasound/ER/dentistry/other CE to get you standing on your own two feet ASAP (since you want to open your own clinic quickly). You don't need to do an internship to learn how to tap a pericardium/chest, GDV, splenectomy/hemoabdomen, etc, which imo are some of the surgical/ER skills that would be helpful for a GP.

If you are dead set, though, I did my rotating internship at BluePearl Tampa and I’d recommend it. Biggest drawback is that you would not be primary surgeon on anything, which is pretty important for your stated career goals.

Most of my clientele would to be able to afford seeing a specialist so it would benefit them, the patient and my business.

I am not sure what you mean here. If you are thinking your intern year will leave you with the ability to manage very complicated cases in the setting of a (brand new) GP clinic, I'd disagree for the most part. Just because you know how to do it (and I feel most GP vets can do anything) doesn't mean you'll have the staffing, time or equipment to do it. Perhaps our definitions of what constitutes a 'complicated case' are different.

 

[MixedAnimals77]

Yeah I've done 5 skin scrape and tape cytologies this week, extracted 14 teeth and bonded sealed a couple teeth yesterday, took out a jaw surgical wire from fx we repaired and currently trying to manage a cat out of its eye melting out of its head because of its necessary pred. Only a handful of patients got pred and abx together this week and it was a very sad allergy doggo and no money cases where i deemed it was appropriate. I would say find some good ce it teaches you a ton that you can implement right away.

I agree with pp if er only is the main goal an intership is probably beneficial because I send my true **** cases there when I run out of usually equipment and resources to deal with a patient. I've never done or would I really entertain the idea of a nephrectomy or any of the things they mentioned.

I will say I think 3-4 years is very ambitious for your goals and tbh 3 years is probably impractical especially if you end up doing an intership just because of how long the startup and buyin timelines take.

I also wanted to go back and touch on the your owners will be able to afford care. They might be able to afford it but are they willing to spend it, those are 2 very different things and I think as you get into practice you'll be surprised. Also just because its an affluent area doesnt mean they handle their money well. As an example I have a client with a terrible allergy cat they have the means to appropriately treat it but o refuses to follow our recommendations (which we've consulted with derm) and thinks they know better themselves...poor poor itchy cat. Meanwhile I've got a client on limited income but would literally and I believe them sell all their worlds possessions to care for that dog and they dropped some serious money for them to figure out it's gi disorder. Again as pp mentioned how do you envision this clinic in the future because truly my limiting factors in treating somethings are resources (staff and equipment) but for an extreme example it doesn't make sense for me to have an mri in my little 1.5 Dr practice

 

[ExoticsandWildlifevet]

Yeah I've done 5 skin scrape and tape cytologies this week, extracted 14 teeth and bonded sealed a couple teeth yesterday, took out a jaw surgical wire from fx we repaired and currently trying to manage a cat out of its eye melting out of its head because of its necessary pred. Only a handful of patients got pred and abx together this week and it was a very sad allergy doggo and no money cases where i deemed it was appropriate. I would say find some good ce it teaches you a ton that you can implement right away.

I agree with pp if er only is the main goal an intership is probably beneficial because I send my true **** cases there when I run out of usually equipment and resources to deal with a patient. I've never done or would I really entertain the idea of a nephrectomy or any of the things they mentioned.

I will say I think 3-4 years is very ambitious for your goals and tbh 3 years is probably impractical especially if you end up doing an intership just because of how long the startup and buyin timelines take.

I also wanted to go back and touch on the your owners will be able to afford care. They might be able to afford it but are they willing to spend it, those are 2 very different things and I think as you get into practice you'll be surprised. Also just because its an affluent area doesnt mean they handle their money well. As an example I have a client with a terrible allergy cat they have the means to appropriately treat it but o refuses to follow our recommendations (which we've consulted with derm) and thinks they know better themselves...poor poor itchy cat. Meanwhile I've got a client on limited income but would literally and I believe them sell all their worlds possessions to care for that dog and they dropped some serious money for them to figure out it's gi disorder. Again as pp mentioned how do you envision this clinic in the future because truly my limiting factors in treating somethings are resources (staff and equipment) but for an extreme example it doesn't make sense for me to have an mri in my little 1.5 Dr practice

Thank you for your replies! I meant to say the majority of my clients would not be able to afford to see specialist so I would like to provide as much as I could within my means. I guess I’m a bit out of touch with what a regular GP does when they continue to do CE and work with other doctors. My doctor would mostly just do spay/neuter, lacerations, tumor resections, and simple surgeries and doesn’t have a tFAST or anything like that. So I figured if I can learn how to do GDVs , become really good with POCUS, ect…I’d be a more well rounded doc then the one I worked for. I do like ER, and I plan to pick up around 1-2 shifts a week on top of GP. I can see how 3 years post school could be a bit ambitious and wouldn’t mind pushing it back to 5 years if I don’t feel ready. I guess it would be based on how much mentorship I can get when I get out of school.

 

[ExoticsandWildlifevet]

I generally recommend internships for those wanting to go into ER full time, but I also I agree with what Jayna and Mix have said. If I was set on going into GP, I would not have done my internship.

The level of cases you'll see at a specialty hospital are often (and supposed to be) out of the scope of what a GP has resources to handle. That's why 24 hour ERs and specialists exist. At the end of my intern year, I scrubbed in on who knows how many septic abdomens, cholies, nephrectomies, etc. Watched hundreds of echos, assisted during many phacos, and so on. If I were going into GP, probably 80+% of what I did that year would not have substantially contributed to the skills I'd need for GP, and the biggest learning point would have been when/what to refer. I think that is valuable knowledge, but would not be worth the lost pay/time to many. Given what you've stated here, it would be far more beneficial for you to go into a really mentorship-heavy GP clinic and take surgical/ultrasound/ER/dentistry/other CE to get you standing on your own two feet ASAP (since you want to open your own clinic quickly). You don't need to do an internship to learn how to tap a pericardium/chest, GDV, splenectomy/hemoabdomen, etc, which imo are some of the surgical/ER skills that would be helpful for a GP.

If you are dead set, though, I did my rotating internship at BluePearl Tampa and I’d recommend it. Biggest drawback is that you would not be primary surgeon on anything, which is pretty important for your stated career goals.


I am not sure what you mean here. If you are thinking your intern year will leave you with the ability to manage very complicated cases in the setting of a (brand new) GP clinic, I'd disagree for the most part. Just because you know how to do it (and I feel most GP vets can do anything) doesn't mean you'll have the staffing, time or equipment to do it. Perhaps our definitions of what constitutes a 'complicated case' are different.

I think we do have different definitions on what complicated is and that’s because I worked for a very old school vet who only did the basics and didn’t have pocus, wouldn’t remove a spleen, never did a gdv, cytology, etc…I just thought a rotating internship with a couple months in internal med would help me better treats those uncontrolled diabetic patients correctly, improve my work ups. Couple months in ER would help me with the ER shifts I’d like to pick up in the future and help treat ER cases when they’d show up in my future clinic. And the rest of the time I thought learning from a dermatologist, optho, or other specialties on cases that I’d see daily would help me best treat them.

 

[ExoticsandWildlifevet]

I generally recommend internships for those wanting to go into ER full time, but I also I agree with what Jayna and Mix have said. If I was set on going into GP, I would not have done my internship.

The level of cases you'll see at a specialty hospital are often (and supposed to be) out of the scope of what a GP has resources to handle. That's why 24 hour ERs and specialists exist. At the end of my intern year, I scrubbed in on who knows how many septic abdomens, cholies, nephrectomies, etc. Watched hundreds of echos, assisted during many phacos, and so on. If I were going into GP, probably 80+% of what I did that year would not have substantially contributed to the skills I'd need for GP, and the biggest learning point would have been when/what to refer. I think that is valuable knowledge, but would not be worth the lost pay/time to many. Given what you've stated here, it would be far more beneficial for you to go into a really mentorship-heavy GP clinic and take surgical/ultrasound/ER/dentistry/other CE to get you standing on your own two feet ASAP (since you want to open your own clinic quickly). You don't need to do an internship to learn how to tap a pericardium/chest, GDV, splenectomy/hemoabdomen, etc, which imo are some of the surgical/ER skills that would be helpful for a GP.

If you are dead set, though, I did my rotating internship at BluePearl Tampa and I’d recommend it. Biggest drawback is that you would not be primary surgeon on anything, which is pretty important for your stated career goals.


I am not sure what you mean here. If you are thinking your intern year will leave you with the ability to manage very complicated cases in the setting of a (brand new) GP clinic, I'd disagree for the most part. Just because you know how to do it (and I feel most GP vets can do anything) doesn't mean you'll have the staffing, time or equipment to do it. Perhaps our definitions of what constitutes a 'complicated case' are different.

Can I take that many CE in one year? Or do you mean do one of those each year ? Any recommendations of GP multi vet clinic/hospitals with good mentorship?

 

[JaynaAli]

You can do

Can I take that many CE in one year? Or do you mean do one of those each year ? Any recommendations of GP multi vet clinic/hospitals with good mentorship?

You can do as much CE you want, at any time. Usually the limiting factors are the expense and how much time your employer is willing to give you off work to attend, but these are things you address and negotiate as part of your employment package after graduation and every so often after you’re employed.

 

[pp9]

Can I take that many CE in one year? Or do you mean do one of those each year ? Any recommendations of GP multi vet clinic/hospitals with good mentorship?

You can take all the CE you want if you have the money for it. Most FT vets get a CE stipend as part of their benefits ($2-3000/year in my perusing, but that would vary of course) but it's quickly spent if you do a conference or more involved/extended CE with surgical labs and travel involved. There's too many GPs in this world to be able to recommend a specific place for you to work without knowing where you are, who's actually hiring, etc.

I think we do have different definitions on what complicated is and that’s because I worked for a very old school vet who only did the basics and didn’t have pocus, wouldn’t remove a spleen, never did a gdv, cytology, etc…I just thought a rotating internship with a couple months in internal med would help me better treats those uncontrolled diabetic patients correctly, improve my work ups. Couple months in ER would help me with the ER shifts I’d like to pick up in the future and help treat ER cases when they’d show up in my future clinic. And the rest of the time I thought learning from a dermatologist, optho, or other specialties on cases that I’d see daily would help me best treat them.

I hear where you're coming from, but you'd learn all of that in GP with good mentorship, and also learn it in a more realistic context than a specialty hospital (ivory tower). The things you've specifically mentioned here are all things I'd expect the average GP clinic to be capable of as long as they have the staffing and time for it. Honestly, you'd get far more primary surgeon experience just going into GP right out of school as well.

It's also worth mentioning that some vets refer everything, some vets do as much as they can before they refer, some never refer anything at all even when they should. Just because you worked in a clinic that did very little beyond the basics does not mean that is how GP medicine is everywhere (I worked in a similar clinic as a pre-vet, actually).

It's your choice, of course. It is just a choice that may not give you the results you are looking for. Based on my experience, a rotating internship just doesn't set you up for GP life.

 

[MixedAnimals77]

Thank you for your replies! I meant to say the majority of my clients would not be able to afford to see specialist so I would like to provide as much as I could within my means. I guess I’m a bit out of touch with what a regular GP does when they continue to do CE and work with other doctors. My doctor would mostly just do spay/neuter, lacerations, tumor resections, and simple surgeries and doesn’t have a tFAST or anything like that. So I figured if I can learn how to do GDVs , become really good with POCUS, ect…I’d be a more well rounded doc then the one I worked for. I do like ER, and I plan to pick up around 1-2 shifts a week on top of GP. I can see how 3 years post school could be a bit ambitious and wouldn’t mind pushing it back to 5 years if I don’t feel ready. I guess it would be based on how much mentorship I can get when I get out of school.

Idk where you are in the proscess of school but would recommend going to a few gp practices 4th year or over the summers if you can so you can see a larger variety of what gps can do. In my town alone it's a very large disparity in medicine. We have a doctor who tbh shouldn't be practicing-treats literally everything with dex,vit b, and gentamicin. A mid-level practice-they do decent medicine but don't have in house labs,rads,or medicine and have to send everything out. Then there's us who offer advanced medicine-inhouse labs,us, and rads and we do our best with what we have and where we are (3hrs from 24hr/er) so alot of times I just do my best because I'm the best shot the pet has

We have an u/s at work I'm not 100% up to speed on afsat/tfast and do not offer full AUS (my friend who is a gp does though) but have enough skills from 4th year and ce that I'll do fna of livers and scan abdomens for tumors when I have fluid filled abdomen and have done thoracocentesis and have dx the need for pericardialcentesis with it.

You can learn a ton at CE. My boss does pins and extracapsular repairs he learned to do at CEs. He's going to do plating soon. I'm trying to decide what I want to do next to add to my skill set.🤔

 

[supershorty]

I'm a current rotating intern (at an internship I like as much as anyone likes their rotating internship 😂 ) and pursuing specialization. I'll just echo what the others have said. If you want to do GP, don't do a rotating internship. The scope of cases that I see is, by and large, beyond what a GP will be seeing and, especially for surgeries, you'll be doing more as an associate than you will as a rotating intern, even if you have a strong surgery interest. It's just the name of the game.

I've learned a huge amount in my intern year so far and for what I want to do, this was the right choice for me, but you'll get great training in a practice that emphasizes mentoring their new grads and, to be honest, most of what you'll see in an internship won't be the kinds of cases you see in GP anyway. If you don't want to specialize, I'd go straight into practice and get mentored while getting paid far better than you would as an intern.

 

[allygator13]

I'm probably in the minority here in stating that I think your idea makes sense, and I am also in the minority that I personally think everyone should do an internship. Not a standard rotating specialty internship as we think of them or have them now, but I think it would be beneficial if there were GP oriented internships for those looking to go into GP. I say this because sure, you can get a job with a GP willing to mentor, but how do we know that GP is practicing the best medicine? We don't. They may be mentoring with old school trains of thought or not be up to date on recent literature and advancements, and that is putting the field behind. So yes in an ideal world you can go into GP and have great mentorship at the best level of care (obviously within the financial constraints of your clientele), but I feel like that's not what happens in the real world. So if you want to do an internship and learn under specialists that are at the top of their game and up to date on literature so you can go out and practice best medicine possible, I personally think that makes sense. I agree with others that what you see may not be the bread and butter of cases you will get in GP (I also would have been very ill-equipped to be a GP after my rotating internship) but if you go into it with GP in mind I think you can better tailor your learning experiences toward that.

 

[supershorty]

think it would be beneficial if there were GP oriented internships for those looking to go into GP.

Sure, but ... there really aren't right now. I personally have a hard time recommending that someone looking to go into GP undergo what is currently an option, which is a rotating internship, when that'll be majority things they won't see in general practice and get paid, what, half (maybe) of what they'd make as an associate? That's a pretty significant financial loss for ultimately no real gain, unlike the gain that may be realized if they were to specialize afterward. They just lose out on the better part of a year's salary.

If there are any internships that are actually geared toward people who want to be in GP, that would be a resource worth compiling.

 

[Trilt]

I'm probably in the minority here in stating that I think your idea makes sense, and I am also in the minority that I personally think everyone should do an internship. Not a standard rotating specialty internship as we think of them or have them now, but I think it would be beneficial if there were GP oriented internships for those looking to go into GP. I say this because sure, you can get a job with a GP willing to mentor, but how do we know that GP is practicing the best medicine? We don't. They may be mentoring with old school trains of thought or not be up to date on recent literature and advancements, and that is putting the field behind. So yes in an ideal world you can go into GP and have great mentorship at the best level of care (obviously within the financial constraints of your clientele), but I feel like that's not what happens in the real world. So if you want to do an internship and learn under specialists that are at the top of their game and up to date on literature so you can go out and practice best medicine possible, I personally think that makes sense. I agree with others that what you see may not be the bread and butter of cases you will get in GP (I also would have been very ill-equipped to be a GP after my rotating internship) but if you go into it with GP in mind I think you can better tailor your learning experiences toward that.

Everything in life is a cost:benefit ratio. Absolutely, you'll be a better vet *for the things you see at a specialty hospital* after an internship. You'll learn a ton.

But is what you learn applicable to 90%+ of the daily cases you'll see in GP? absolutely not. Is it worth literally uprooting your life and the income loss compared to just going into GP? Will you really be a generally better vet for your GP clientele compared to doing a year of GP work? I don't believe so.

Having gone straight into GP and then transitioning to ER/specialty work, frankly the case loads, budgets and expectations are just different in so many ways. Spending a literal year learning how to manage complex medical cases with resources WAY beyond what you have available in GP and completely neglecting:
preventative care, long term management/communication strategies, skin/allergies, dentistry and basic ST surgeries... aka things that makes up the absolute majority of GP work... is just silly to me.

I would perhaps think differently if there were actually GP oriented internships. Our current system is not that.

 

[Trilt]

Anyway, so to answer the OP: imo don't do a rotating for general practice work.

Get a job, ideally at a hospital with good mentorship and multiple vets so you can get exposure to different ways of doing things, and spend your first couple years in practice absolutely soaking up every bit of information you can. Do VIN's getting through the day/getting through the night, do dentistry training, online CE, volunteer with your local shelter or feral cat operation to get better at tissue handling, join vet FB groups and browse VIN to organically learn about new things constantly.

You don't need a formal program to be a good vet, but you do need to *care* and work at it - vet school is absolutely just the beginning, not the end all.

 

[allygator13]

Sure, but ... there really aren't right now. I personally have a hard time recommending that someone looking to go into GP undergo what is currently an option, which is a rotating internship, when that'll be majority things they won't see in general practice and get paid, what, half (maybe) of what they'd make as an associate? That's a pretty significant financial loss for ultimately no real gain, unlike the gain that may be realized if they were to specialize afterward. They just lose out on the better part of a year's salary.

If there are any internships that are actually geared toward people who want to be in GP, that would be a resource worth compiling.

Everything in life is a cost:benefit ratio. Absolutely, you'll be a better vet *for the things you see at a specialty hospital* after an internship. You'll learn a ton.

But is what you learn applicable to 90%+ of the daily cases you'll see in GP? absolutely not. Is it worth literally uprooting your life and the income loss compared to just going into GP? Will you really be a generally better vet for your GP clientele compared to doing a year of GP work? I don't believe so.

Having gone straight into GP and then transitioning to ER/specialty work, frankly the case loads, budgets and expectations are just different in so many ways. Spending a literal year learning how to manage complex medical cases with resources WAY beyond what you have available in GP and completely neglecting:
preventative care, long term management/communication strategies, skin/allergies, dentistry and basic ST surgeries... aka things that makes up the absolute majority of GP work... is just silly to me.

I would perhaps think differently if there were actually GP oriented internships. Our current system is not that.

Exactly, which is why I said there would need to be GP oriented internships. Our current system is not set up for that, and that is what I'm saying. But I think it should be. Even human GPs do an internship and residency, I think we should move that way tbh. As has been a recurrent theme in discussions on this forum, 4 years of vet school is still not enough time to learn everything a GP needs to know. But again, I realize I'm in the minority.

 

[battie]

Even human GPs do an internship and residency, I think we should move that way tbh.

I wish we could have veterinarians go through the course of internships/residencies like in human med. The problem is the money. The human medical industry is so drastically different with so much more money that I doubt we will ever have that system.