What's the coolest part of being in vet school?

[StealthDog]

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All right, vet students... Lest the first-years and pre-vets start thinking that vet school is all about stress and exams and never seeing your friends or family, let's show them all the cool things you get to do as a vet student.

I'll just be starting my second year.. Here's some of the stuff I got to do during my first:

-learned how to handle horses and cows (very cool for someone who grew up in the 'burbs)
-managed to dissect our pony's penis so nicely that our anatomy professor called it one of the best penises he's ever seen (high praise)
-got to do a necropsy on a red tailed hawk
-got to help haul a hibernating bear out of her den to place a radio collar on her
-got to watch my professor blow-dart a baby zebra
-made a lot of people in Perkins uncomfortable during our late-night study sessions ("Okay, pretend you're going to be sperm. Where do you start?")
-revived our school's holistic medicine club
-got to wire a turtle's fractured carapace
-drove down to Mizzou in the middle of an ice storm that caused Missouri to declare a state of emergency just so we could attend the exotic animal symposium
-spent deer hunting weekend asking hunters if I could remove some lymph nodes from their deer so we could test them for TB
-relaxed (i.e. got drunk with) with vet school friends in that wonderful weight-free period right after a test is over

What cool stuff did you guys do last year?

 

[jfitzpatri8]

2 Equine Dental Wetlabs (including nerve blocks), 2 equine podiatry wetlabs (including interpretation of radiographs), bandaging wetlab, my first bovine rectal palpation, SAVMA symposium, Michigan Vet Med Convention, foal team, assist in colic surgery (x 2)... what is it with 2's?

And, just this week I got paired up with my Little Sib, and get to try to impart all of my first-year wisdom in just 2 weeks! Poor girl left my house with 2 loads full of textbooks and coursepacks, and a FULL 1 Gig USB jumpdrive!

Vet school rocks! And, don't forget the free food at least twice a week all year!

Jenn

 

[KittenKiller]

Man, you all are making me smile, but I have a feeling none of that awesome stuff is coming anytime soon! All I've got to show for vet school so far is four VERY LARGE textbooks and the worst part - no color pictures! I was really looking forward to glossy pages, legible text, and pretty pictures - but NOOOO you practically need a magifying glass to read the text. <3

 

[Emio]

Man, you all are making me smile, but I have a feeling none of that awesome stuff is coming anytime soon! All I've got to show for vet school so far is four VERY LARGE textbooks and the worst part - no color pictures! I was really looking forward to glossy pages, legible text, and pretty pictures - but NOOOO you practically need a magifying glass to read the text. <3

damn. i have two anatomy texts coming next week... so excited! don't tell me the histo text is lacking color pictures....

 

[cyrille104]

damn. i have two anatomy texts coming next week... so excited! don't tell me the histo text is lacking color pictures....

I read that as "two anatomy tests" and started freaking out 😱

I talked to some 2nd years on Weds. night and they basically told me how much I should NOT be excited.

 

[Emio]

I read that as "two anatomy tests" and started freaking out 😱

I talked to some 2nd years on Weds. night and they basically told me how much I should NOT be excited.

where have you been dude?? classes started two weeks ago!!

lol, i was on campus once in the spring, and there were a bunch of first years that were in the middle of finals week, and when they found out i was a newbie, they said, 'don't talk to us right now. we hate everything about vet school at the moment.'

btw, i'm hella jealous about the antagonizing hibernating BEARS part.

 

[StealthDog]

btw, i'm hella jealous about the antagonizing hibernating BEARS part.

Oh yes, I have photo evidence:

 

[StealthDog]

but I have a feeling none of that awesome stuff is coming anytime soon!

Oh, but it is! Try to participate in wetlabs and attend a conference that you think sounds interesting, even if you don't feel like you're ready or like you'll understand anything... That's where you get the coolest experiences and learn the most!

 

[laurafinn]

Vet school is great! I love herding the sheep on our little farmlet (and now it's lambing season!), and doing practice physical exams and neuro exams on the practice dogs.

Plus, I've gotten to do stuff I never in a million years would have imagined -- like rouseying (helping sheep shearers by gathering and sorting wool as they shear) in the far, far reaches of New Zealand King Country while listening to Duran Duran's "Girls on Film" on the radio. (Most random moment ever)

 

[Emio]

Oh yes, I have photo evidence:

briliant!

 

[ckgilabert]

I AM SOO JEALOUS!!!!! that little bear looks like my gruffi!!

 

[LittleBit]

For all of my whining & moaning about vet school, I really wouldn't want to be doing anything else.

You meet so many awesome people, through class, school and conferences. I love learning, which is probably a large part of why I'm drawn to this profession. There's so much to know, and you can either learn a little about everything (ie general practice), or pick something you really enjoy & learn a ton about that (ie specialist).

I've gotten to practice placing bone plates on random legs, feed & hold a variety of raptors, gone to the SAVMA conference in Minneapolis & the AAV conference in San Antonio & recently in Providence, learned how much sleep I actually *need* to function, fed my caffeine addiction, and mastered the art of procrastinating 😉
I forgot to add that I've also been able to take care of foals during off-hours and seen a rumen impaction surgery on a kangaroo.

I'm excited (although a little terrified) of clinics and actually "calling the shots". It's also very cool that I have no idea what I want to do when I graduate, but that I have basically limitless choices so I know I'll end up doing something I love.

Anyway... Vet School = awesome overall... just don't ask me that once classes are in full swing 🙄

 

[HeartSong]

The coolest part? Oh man there's too many to pick out just one.

~Hmm there's the midnight food fights, except instead of food you use pieces cut from your dog cadaver.
~Staring slightly bewildered as your professors rock out on their guitars in the middle of class singing vet school versions of classic rock songs.
~Chatting with friends over lunch at a nearby restaurant, glancing around realizing that the brave souls who decided to sit near you are struggling to keep their food down after overhearing you talk about what you learned in class that day.
~Learning to catch a llama during a field trip to a professor's llama farm. Plus the big pot luck picnic during the same trip.
~Buying a bunch of vet school T-shirts so when you do manage time to do something outside of vet school, you still carry a little vet school with you.
~Bottle raising a puppy that was found abandoned at only four days old (of course a year and a half later I still have him 😳.)
~Rum cake contest (professor were the judges)
~Christmas party and other parties at professors' houses.
~Potluck dinners
~Food, lots of food.
~Club meetings, wet labs
~The day after the last final when you finally get to sleep. 😴

 

[cyrille104]

~Hmm there's the midnight food fights, except instead of food you use pieces cut from your dog cadaver.
~Staring slightly bewildered as your professors rock out on their guitars in the middle of class singing vet school versions of classic rock songs.
~Chatting with friends over lunch at a nearby restaurant, glancing around realizing that the brave souls who decided to sit near you are struggling to keep their food down after overhearing you talk about what you learned in class that day.
~Learning to catch a llama during a field trip to a professor's llama farm. Plus the big pot luck picnic during the same trip.
...
~The day after the last final when you finally get to sleep. 😴

Hahahahaha

 

[theunraveler]

coolest part of vet medicine is VETS1023 Animal Handling Course 🙂

i got to learn and handle alot of different type of animals which was fun and it sure beats studying