Camden Stint Over

I finished my last exam on Wednesday and no more lectures ever. Woo hoo!! Will be starting my yearlong clinical rotations in January 2008. Thought I’d give a recap of all what I did and learned at Camden this past semester. In addition to lectures on ruminants (cattle, and sheep), pigs, poultry, horses, and pocket pets, I participated in weekly prac classes. Some of the cooler stuff I learned included pregnancy testing in cows (you have to stick you whole arm up the bum of a cow in case you were wondering…); giving an epidural to a cow; learning how to do a necropsy to investigate cause of death or disease (human equivalent of autopsy); equine anaesthesia and dentistry.

Of all my classes, I really enjoyed equine lectures and practicals the best. Some of my favourite pracs included learning how to float horse teeth (you have to use these giant-like nail files and rasp the teeth to remove the sharp edges); performing an ophthalmic examination (which I had to give a nerve block first to prevent sensation and keep the eyelid open…); and equine anaesthesia. In equine anaesthesia, I was the closest to guess the horse’s weight so I got to put in the jugular catheter. Before I could do this, I had to first inject local anaesthetic into the skin just over the jugular vein. Then, I had to insert this really long catheter (about 6 inches long) into the jugular vein. I was nervous and excited at the same time, but my prof was there talking to me the whole time. Later we used the jugular catheter to insert various drugs to make the horse lose consciousness like if you were to do in the field for surgeries etc. And, wow what an amazing experience watching this huge beautiful creature fall gracefully to the ground in 3 mins!