Students & Teaching in the Small Animal Practice

Students & Teaching in the Small Animal Practice

Run by Alison Blaxter BAHons DipCABC PhD BVM&S MRCVS

Many clients ask me about the practice’s role in the veterinary course at Bristol University, and specifically about the stages of training in which you see the students. These pages are intended to give you an idea of the Veterinary course and YOUR involvement in training the vets of the future!

Hot news - The year of 2011! They were an amazing year group AND they all passed! We wish them all the best for their future careers.

What do the students think of working in the SAP?

We ask for feedback at the end of each student’s time with us and the comments speak for themselves! It is clear that they find you, and your animals and the chance to deal with you directly as one of the most rewarding bits of the course!

The final year – clinical rotations

…it was amazing to actually see real clients and deal with them as if I was a real vet. I cant wait to graduate now…

The students in the practice are in their final – usually 5th or 6th - year of the course which is solely practically based. The year consists of a series of ‘clinical rotations’ where small groups of students spend concentrated pieces of time – usually 3 weeks - learning skills in specific areas.

The main rotations are in the practices on site – we are only one of them as we have ‘sister’ practices in the farm animal practice and the equine practice – and in the referral Hospitals on site for small animals and horses. There are over 60 veterinary clinicians working in these practices and Hospitals so the students are exposed to a vast amount of expertise and practical work. There are also rotations in imaging (radiography and ultrasonography), clinical pathology, anaesthesia, surgery, preventive medicine in farm work, and public health.

We are very fortunate to have close relationships with other private or charity clinics and hospitals and some students will spend time at the PDSA in Bristol or the RSPCA in Manchester as well.

……The best bit of the rotation was talking to Mrs X about Bonnie. She really seemed to appreciate what I was trying to say and I almost cried when she said how kind Id been.

Client involvement in other aspects of University work

We also ask for your help in other areas of University activity, some of which you may not be aware of. We are always interested in having MORE help so if any of the following sounds interesting do come and talk to Alison in the practice.

Teaching

• In 2010 and 2011 sixteen brave client volunteers worked with small groups of 2nd year students helping them develop history taking skills. For some of these students this was the first time they had talked to clients on veterinary matters and they just loved it! We hope to repeat the teaching in our Professional Studies course next year.

• Since 2007 we have advertised for volunteers to role play ‘difficult’ clients for students in an Elective at the end of the Final year on Communication Skills. Several ‘Am. Dram.’ thespians have taken the students through consultations revolving around highly challenging situations such as decisions around treatment and euthanasia, ethical dilemmas and financial worries. Everyone loves these role play sessions despite the high emotional content!

Developing teaching material

• We are in the process of making a series of interactive computer based ‘tutorials’ based on videos of common situations in practice for students in years 1 and 2. Examples of these are gaining consent for operations, or reporting how a patient has been in hospital. Clients have been recruited to help us film several versions of the same interaction with a student and we are then using these as the basis for this novel teaching ‘tool’. As a ‘tool’ we are hoping to show it actually works through a small project with the present 2nd years to validate its use in the future.

……The clients are great – they are so relaxed and let me do absolutely everything despite me being so slow….