Week 4 of 13

The week started as all the others have, with lectures online. I'm finding Mondays pretty tough because it's non-stop lectures from 0715 until 1630. At least I'm at home and can go and make a cup of tea whenever I want, but it's difficult to stay focussed for that long. 

We were supposed to go on our Obstetrics trip on Tuesday, but unfortunately the teacher is sick, so we had an online practical instead. It was pretty interesting, about diagnosing pregnancy, but it would have been better to see the ultrasounds in person. We also had a very interesting lecture in Internal Diseases of Small Animals about endocrinopathological causes of skin disease. 

On Wednesday, I went on my second epizoo trip. This time we were vaccinating calves against dermatophytoses (ringworm). Ringworm is caused by trichophyton or microsporidium, and these calves are getting ready to be transported to another farm. The vaccination schedule is 3 weeks long, so the next group is going to do their second shots, and then the farm will do the last one. It was pretty interesting, we just did a general inspection of the calves, took their temperature, then vaccinated them. If they had a temperature, or diarrhea, or a cough, then we didn't vaccinate them; instead we'd take blood. The group I was working with was very efficient, so we went around to another part of the farm to help the teacher vaccinate some slightly older calves. At the end of the day, we had a practical in Exotics, where we learnt about dental disease in rabbits - we anaesthetised one of the uni rabbits and got to examine his teeth!

 

Thursday was another completely online day. I started by learning about how pigs are prepared and inspected for slaughter, then I had a diseases of ruminants lecture about treatment of Bovine Respiratory Disease (BRD), then finished the day with a lecture about Staphylococcus and Streptococcus infections.  Throughout the day I was working on my thesis - reading other papers, editing the data I've collected already, and writing more in my literature review.

Friday was a lovely relaxed day. I didn't have andrology in the morning because another group was on a trip, so I didn't start until 1405! I came into uni early-ish (around 0830) to collect some papers from my thesis supervisor, then I went to the library. I spent a few hours in there working on my thesis, doing ankis and learning some pathological anatomy stuff. In the afternoon, we did a necropsy on a dog that died from leptospirosis. I was the scribe this time, which was cool. The poor dog was very sick, but the pathological changes were very interesting to see. I stayed back at the end of the practical to talk to the lecturer, and he said there was a very interesting diploma thesis topic in what we did today. If I hadn't already got a topic, I was pretty tempted! When we were done, I walked home with Nicole, had a nap, and spent some of my evening working on my A1 Slovak course. 

Currently watching: The Walking Dead | Currently reading: The Picture of Dorian Grey

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