UMN vs UW-Madison vs Mizzou vs UF

[eleanor713]

---

Members don't see this ad.

I'm sure you've all had enough of me on this forum but I have a list of questions for current/ recently graduated students at these schools to help me choose. I have already factored cost and location into my decision for those of you that say to go to the cheapest/IS 🙂
1. What is the class schedule like, such as in class 8-5 everyday, classes early labs in the afternoon, etc?
2. What mental health initiatives are in place for the students?
3. How many rotations are done not at the vet school, are you commuting often for clinicals or are they all at the hospital?
4. What is student involvement in the OR, is it just watching or can students assist?
5. What residency programs are not offered at the hospital?
6. What are the tasks of students on clinical rotations?
7. What is the student to patient ratio during core clinicals?
8. What programs are established between the incoming class and upperclassman?
9. What does the school do to help with NAVLE?
10. How often are you working in the clinical skills lab and is it open outside of class time?
11. Are there a lot of social events outside of vet med that students do together?

 

[supershorty]

UMN c/o 2024 student here

I'm sure you've all had enough of me on this forum but I have a list of questions for current/ recently graduated students at these schools to help me choose. I have already factored cost and location into my decision for those of you that say to go to the cheapest/IS 🙂
1. What is the class schedule like, such as in class 8-5 everyday, classes early labs in the afternoon, etc?

I’m going to leave this q for someone else because I went through the old curriculum, but PSV gave some good insight on this in the UMN thread.

2. What mental health initiatives are in place for the students?

There’s an embedded counselor and a social worker within the hospital. I haven’t met the counselor, the social worker and I have met about a few cases/clients who I wanted to suggest a consult for. There are also social work rounds on several of the rotations that can have rough conversations (ER, Oncology, IM) so that there’s a safe space to work through complex feelings about those.

3. How many rotations are done not at the vet school, are you commuting often for clinicals or are they all at the hospital?

We are required to do at least 3 externships of 2 weeks’ duration. Most people do more. Other rotations are in the hospital.

4. What is student involvement in the OR, is it just watching or can students assist?

This is student-dependent. Someone interested in surgery, taking initiative on their cases, etc. is going to get to do more than someone who is checked out. You’re not going to cut an abdominal explore, but you might get to palpate and close, and you’ll get to cut some more basic GP surgeries on primary care (which typically sees spay/neuter unless they’re also having a lap pexy, then they go to the surgery department).

5. What residency programs are not offered at the hospital?

I think you’ll find that this both changes by the year and is not necessarily something that students know. Residencies are determined by a lot of factors and while a program may be deficient one year, it might be resolved within the time you’re in school.

6. What are the tasks of students on clinical rotations?

Rotation dependent. Some rotations, you’re the primary clinician. Others, you’re taking histories, doing exams, and doing a lot of paperwork. 4th year is definitely the best year, IMO.

7. What is the student to patient ratio during core clinicals?

also rotation dependent. I’ve had some rotations where I saw upwards of 10 patients a day and others where I just had 1 to focus on.

8. What programs are established between the incoming class and upperclassman?

We have a club that is mentoring first years, called Jump Start, and also our orientation program, GOALE, has upperclassmen involved.

9. What does the school do to help with NAVLE?

Nothing lol

10. How often are you working in the clinical skills lab and is it open outside of class time?

Our practice area is open 24/7, but not staffed with people 24/7 lol. We had clinical skills a lot in my curriculum and I think the new curriculum has more tbh.

11. Are there a lot of social events outside of vet med that students do together?

There are, for those who want that. I’m fairly antisocial so I’ve never gone to those

 

[eleanor713]

UMN c/o 2024 student here

I’m going to leave this q for someone else because I went through the old curriculum, but PSV gave some good insight on this in the UMN thread.

There’s an embedded counselor and a social worker within the hospital. I haven’t met the counselor, the social worker and I have met about a few cases/clients who I wanted to suggest a consult for. There are also social work rounds on several of the rotations that can have rough conversations (ER, Oncology, IM) so that there’s a safe space to work through complex feelings about those.

We are required to do at least 3 externships of 2 weeks’ duration. Most people do more. Other rotations are in the hospital.

This is student-dependent. Someone interested in surgery, taking initiative on their cases, etc. is going to get to do more than someone who is checked out. You’re not going to cut an abdominal explore, but you might get to palpate and close, and you’ll get to cut some more basic GP surgeries on primary care (which typically sees spay/neuter unless they’re also having a lap pexy, then they go to the surgery department).

I think you’ll find that this both changes by the year and is not necessarily something that students know. Residencies are determined by a lot of factors and while a program may be deficient one year, it might be resolved within the time you’re in school.

Rotation dependent. Some rotations, you’re the primary clinician. Others, you’re taking histories, doing exams, and doing a lot of paperwork. 4th year is definitely the best year, IMO.

also rotation dependent. I’ve had some rotations where I saw upwards of 10 patients a day and others where I just had 1 to focus on.

We have a club that is mentoring first years, called Jump Start, and also our orientation program, GOALE, has upperclassmen involved.

Nothing lol

Our practice area is open 24/7, but not staffed with people 24/7 lol. We had clinical skills a lot in my curriculum and I think the new curriculum has more tbh.

There are, for those who want that. I’m fairly antisocial so I’ve never gone to those

Thank you so much!

 

[Alicat9152]

I'll get back to ya after my final this morning for Mizzou stuff! 💛🖤

 

[Alicat9152]

Wow, so sorry about that delay! Here's all things Mizzou 🙂

1. What is the class schedule like, such as in class 8-5 everyday, classes early labs in the afternoon, etc?

So our schedule varies each IP. IP's (there are 11 of them) are 8 week-long blocks and how our didactic schedule is divided the 1st, 2 years of the curriculum. After IP 11, you will start over at the hospital for your 2 years of clinical rotations. Typically, every 8 weeks you'll have finals that last week of the IP and then a weekend to relax before the next IP starts. I say typically as your first 2 IP's (1+2) function as a semester instead and will be combined with finals being at the end of IP 2 prior to winter break. The school does this combo to help ease students into the curriculum and make it a potentially student dependent easier transition from say undergraduate to a professional program. For IP 1 and 2 we take 4 overarching classes 2 of which have a specific lab component to them. We take small animal gross anatomy (w/ lab), physiology broken into several different units (neurophysiology, muscle, cardio physiology, microvascular, respiratory physiology, and renal physiology), microanatomy (w/ lab), and cell biology. Physiology has separate clinical correlations with each unit with an associated lab each unit where clinicians from the hospital will come over and lecture. We will typically begin at 8 am and depending on when you have lab that day you may be here till 4-5p if you have the later lab time. The class is split into 2 groups for labs and rotate as to who has early lab vs late lab during the week. If you have gross anatomy lab that day the next day you would have microanatomy lab and so forth. Your 1st year of vet school will go from IP1-IP5 and ends the end of June, with second year picking up late August with IP6. We do have a winter break after IP2 as well as a spring break middle of IP4.

2. What mental health initiatives are in place for the students?

The school has two boarded psychologists for the vet school and only for the vet school. You are able to schedule an appointment with them whenever. Their offices are located within the veterinary building and very accessible, they will work with your class schedule and are flexible with appointments. If it is deemed that you need additional resources, they may refer you to an outside psychiatrist to give you the resources needed or if medications are deemed necessary. They will lecture at various times of the year on mental health for students, all are optional to attend.

There is an accessibility center as well that will work with you if you need accommodations during your time in the program. They work with the academic affairs at the vet school and will work with you if changes need to be made.

Whoever is elected as your class President will advocate for the class and work with professors to hold exam reviews (pre and post exam), as well as move exams if needed and voted on by the whole class if there is an exam heavy week or something along those lines.

3. How many rotations are done not at the vet school, are you commuting often for clinicals or are they all at the hospital?

How many rotations are not done at the vet school is completely dependent on you. There are 16 required blocks you have to complete at the school (between small animal, equine, and food animal). I am not sure how many elective blocks you have but you can elect to do an elective rotation at the school or you it to do an externship at an outside facility, there is also a free block you will take, this free block can be used for externships or vacations etc. Rotations will range from 2-6 weeks long and all depend on what block/rotation you are on. Clinical schedules are made in the middle of your 2nd year.

4. What is student involvement in the OR, is it just watching or can students assist?

There are 2 specific sx classes you will take during didactics and then an optional food animal medicine sx elective you can take in IP11. Preparation for surgery starts as soon as your 1st year with clinical skills though. A new IP based clinical skill "class" was created and current VM1's are the 1st class to go through it so its a little sticky but we are working through the kinks. In essence you are assigned 5 skills that you must complete at some point in that IP, these are logged on your own, based on an honor system and the IP based skills are P/F. You are assigned 5 new skills each IP. So in IP1 you will do a couple sx specific skills such as, arming and disarming a scalpel blade/handle for example. As you progress through the curriculum skills will become more advanced and involved. In the actual clinical skills course, you take in IP3/4 there is a surgery skills portion where you do things like knot tying and gowning/gloving to prepare you for surgery classes as a VM2. In clinics if it is your patient that is going to surgery you essentially go with them and either are running anesthesia or are assisting the clinician/resident. If you want to be more involved are are showing initiative the more you will get out of that rotation. For required rotations you will be required to take SA soft tissue surgery, SA orthopedic surgery, neurosurgery, food animal surgery, and equine surgery, as well as your shelter med rotation which is a lot of spays/neuters. As far as didactics go an important note is that you have 24/7 access with you badge/ID to the school and VHC so if you have time and want to go over to the hospital to see if a surgery is going on you can. I have heard it has happened before but if a clinician sees you observing outside the window they might invite you into the OR to observe. There is a call team associated with equine club but is open to everyone and this is colic team. Basically if a colic comes into the ICU and you are on call that week you have the ability to go in and observe a full colic workup and if that horse were to go to surgery pending comfort level you will have the opportunity to go observe the surgery. I have yet to do that but a colic member from the week prior who is a VM2 said she went into the OR when she went in, but I did get to go run a PCV/TP for the resident during the workup and take clinical notes of what was going on/findings during the exam. Can be involved as you want it to be, if you want to learn, they are very willing to teach.

5. What residency programs are not offered at the hospital?

The school accepts interns as well as residents in all specialties. After you graduate with your DVM, if a residency/specialization is something you want to work towards you'll do an internship or two prior to applying to residencies. But the school has programs for both interns and residents after graduation.

6. What are the tasks of students on clinical rotations?

This is a great question that I do not know a ton about as I'm not in clinics yet. However, what I do know is that clinical students will take initial histories and do initial exams. After initial conversations are done they go back to chat with the resident on the case and/or clinician and then everyone goes back in to chat with the owner(s) and plans are made for additional diagnostics etc. For any rotation that you are in charge of a pet that stays in the ICU, you are responsible for that patients treatments and medications. For ER/ICU rotations you will rotate call with other clinical students as well and overnights. If you are called in for your patient or an emergency you need to be 20 minutes or less away from the hospital. This goes for small animal ICU as well as equine ICU. During the day you are assisting residents/interns and clinicians with cases, for food animal and equine you may be out helping with appointments for ambulatory in the trucks. For ambo students on this rotation will rotate call with other clinical students if an emergency is called in and ambo is needed. Clinical students are responsible for charting/SOAPS which is then verified by the resident/clinician prior to submitting as well as helping with any treatments during the day if that is your assigned patient, and making sure all medications needed for the next day are drawn up and good to go for the overnight and next day.

7. What is the student to patient ratio during core clinicals?

This I am unsure about. I work in equine ICU so I have seen students with up to 7 patients, but this will definitely vary day to day and depends on who is all in hospital as some/most patients will go home same day unless they are admitted to the ICU for further workup/monitoring/procedures.

8. What programs are established between the incoming class and upperclassman?

The summer before you start you will get an email/several actually from the current VM1 class president who will have you fill out a personality/get to know you survey that helps us match you with a rising VM2 who will serve as your mentor through 1st year. We call is the big-little program and it is the sole mentorship program between incoming class (littles) and upperclassmen (VM2 big). Your big will stay in contact with you and might leave you little surprises in your mailbox (who doesn't love free candy before a big exam!). They can be a resource for you and will also give you laundry. Laundry is a blanket term for old exams/quizzes from 1st year classes that sometimes will go as far back as the 80's, lol. You can use this laundry to study from and see what was asked in previous years etc. Your big might also give you your anatomy lab coat, a dissection kit, textbooks they have accumulated and don't want/need anymore, passwords to Quizlet's they made, or others have made for studying etc. The week prior to classes starting you will go through VET which is our 3-day orientation for incoming VM1's and ambassadors/VM2's/faculty and staff will be your group leaders through this. Its optional but I highly recommend going as its a good way to get to know your classmates and professors 🙂

9. What does the school do to help with NAVLE?

The one thing I know for sure is that the school gives you a NAVLE block you can use to study. We are given access to VIN as a VM1 which is a great resource. The school to my knowledge doesn't provide this but there are study packages/programs through like Vetprep or Zuku which run sales during NAVLE season to help you study. As a 1st year you can sign up for Zuku questions which come weekly to your email and are questions that have been on past NAVLE exams. Again, nothing specific I know of that the school does except for giving clinical students that study block but there could be something that I just don't know about yet!

10. How often are you working in the clinical skills lab and is it open outside of class time?

You have 24/7 access to the school and VHC with your student badge, this includes the clinical skills lab in the vet building. Some of those IP based skills I mentioned above can be completed in the skills lab, others you need a physical animal which can be a pet or over at the VHC or an outside clinic. You'll be in there sometimes IP3 and 4 for the actual clinical skills (graded) class but a good portion of clinical skills will be held at the hospital or a larger space in the vet building like Adams conference center, for the surgery portion of clinical skills you will do these in the gross anatomy lab. When you are a VM3 your IP11 will consist of electives which are all going to be clinically oriented and teach you other technical skills prior to entering clinics.

11. Are there a lot of social events outside of vet med that students do together?

There are 2 bigger events as a VM1 we lovingly call the toaster and roaster, one held after your 1st gross anatomy exam/practical and then other at the end of IP5 when you transition from a VM1 to a VM2. We have a pretty decent bar scene in downtown Columbia and have a bar crawl if that is your type of thing, you will have 2 spirit reps for your class that are in charge of planning other events and get togethers outside of classes. We just had it this past weekend, but the fur ball is put on by the executive team for the VM2's and is school wide, basically vet school prom 🙂. Some students go out on the weekends, and some don't, really depends on you and what you want to do!

Let me know if y'all have any other questions and feel free to PM as well!