Diagnosis: Vet Student

this is a Good Opportunity considering i was never a big fan of fawkes’ movie design how about

AQUATIC (penguin)

No wait

this is terrible

put it back

the poor thing

Elegant

Classic

Like Cleopatra, he burns upon the water

Equal parts beauty and danger

Full of Secrets

But take it a few genes to the left and you’ve got a GOOSE

A raptor if raptors were total idiots

Neither beauty nor grace

Full of Hate

Has so much poop for you

@english-history-trip that is some powerful art, and I respect the trip that it represents from the sublime to the absurd, for in this journey we find enlightenment.

You know what birds those are?

FLAMINGOS!

Apologize

For

Shaming

Social media is a strange beast, and if you haven’t lived in it for a while then you probably don’t understand how it works. It’s also fairly new on the scene, really coming into its own in the last ten years or so.

When I was a vet student, the university didn’t have a social media policy. Social media wasn’t a ‘thing’ and it wasn’t something they concerned themselves with. It just wasn’t on the radar.

I got my Facebook account some time in vet school, and I started a blog ‘Nearly-Dr Ferox’ about half way through.

You will not find ‘Nearly-Dr Ferox’ on the internet anymore.

put your phone on silent and put it across the room

listen to classical/soundtrack music without lyrics

make index cards for important vocab

wear pajamas

make diagrams and pictures. they don’t have to look pretty, as long as you understand it

make timelines for historical events

have a light snack

drink coffee or tea to keep you going

take a break every hour or so

have one pencil/black pen and one colored pen or highlighter. anything more will just distract you. the aesthetics aren’t important, your knowledge is

don’t be afraid to email/message your teacher or a classmate if you don’t understand something. the last thing you want to do is learn the incorrect information

know that sleep and health is more important than your grade. you cannot perform as well on a test if you are tired or sick. take care of yourself

it’s not a race. it’s not about who can learn something in the quickest time, it’s about learning

take a deep breath 

prioritize your homework by how long it will take you and when it’s due

plan some you time in between studying and school

if you’re mentally exhausted, set a timer for 30 minutes and take a nap. any longer and you’ll wake up even more tired

don’t understand something? that’s perfectly fine, don’t stress over it. ask for help rather than complaining

have a goal in mind and write them down. say things like “i am getting an education so i can get the job of my dreams. the life that i want. the happiness that i deserve”

be thankful. it is a privilege that you get to go to school and get an education. 

Since there was apparently a need, I made a couple of images to explain why asking for veterinary advice online will often be met with silence, and why you just shouldn’t do it. Get a vet on the phone and they will tell you if you need to bring the animal in. I have tried to keep civil, but I do have very strong opinions on the topic.

I’ve heard all the excuses. I don’t care, you call your local clinic.

So studying anatomy is nothing like any other topic, especially when you study it at uni level, where they expect you to know every single small component of the body! So this guide is going to be concerning the musculoskeletal system and the nerves (PNS) and arteries in the body. 

I have mentioned some of these tips before but I will put them in here aswell and so this can work as sort of masterpost. This is like a more “overall” type of masterpost. So if you want to have topic specific posts for example for nerves and arteries then let me know. 

1. Find a study partner. First and foremost anatomy is so much easier when you are two dealing with it. Me and my study partner used to do anatomy spots together and by doing it two people together you can discuss what it could possibly be. You get to hear their train of thoughts which sometimes can be better than yours. Also you will have someone to quiz you and correct you when you say something wrong. 

2. Accept that it takes time. First step to learning anatomy is dedicating a lot of time. It is not easy, you are cramming so much information into your mind and for it to stay there you will have to go over the same topic again and again and again. And I know it is really frustrating and you are going to spent maybe 10 hours trying to figure out the muscles of the leg and then next week when you review it again it will feel like a whole new topic, but this is all a part of the proces, just keep revising again and again and again. 

3. The Atlas is your best friend. Invest in a good atlas, they are a little expensive but they work wonders because first of all they give you an image of what you study. And usually the text book images are not enough. In an atlas you will have “isolated” images but you will also have images where relations are shown. HOWEVER if you dont want to buy an actual atlas then maybe buy Complete anatomy which is a computer program that I also reffered to in my “5 sites every med student should know about” post. Here you can play around with the structures, view it from different angles and add on to it with other nearby structures or remove structures. 

4. Say it out loud. Pretty self explanatory. 

5. Create an overview. Rather than focusing on the details try to focus on creating an overview. Anatomy is already so difficult so dont complicate things for yourself. And if you know the basics then learning the details will be so much easier. 

6. Use a whiteboard. Speaking of creating an overview, try using a white board for this. It is such a good way for creating an overview. I think because deleting and writing is so easy it kinda makes it less stressful than writing in a note book where ofcourse you worry about the aesthetic. Also try to do this with your study partner. You can plan on studying a topic together so lets say for example the muscles of the leg, you both at home study it, try to memorize it, look at it in an atlas and then you two meet. Now when you meet you get infront of a white board and start talking and writing about what you guys think is important and when you guys cant go any further then grab your notes and then add more on to the board. 

7. MAKE IT VISUAL!. This is the most important step! Use bones, pay attention in your dissection classes, if you have the upportunity to touch, feel and look at structures then DO IT! This is the best way to learn. Spot as often as you can.

8. Make up rules. you can find a lot of them online, or just make some up yourself, me and my study partner did, for example the muscles  M. erector spinae: I (m. iliocostalis) Like (m. longissimus) Standing (m. spinalis). If you turn it into a “game” then remembering it will be much easier.

And most importantly dont stress your mind that much. Allow yourself to take breaks, because over feeding your mind with knowledge in a short period of time can also be very damaging since you will waste time and not remember most of what you studied.  

Good luck, stay motivated and stay dedicated

Love 

Neglect is not inherently malicious. It’s often not something you intend to do. It stems from a lack of education on the proper care. It’s when you know the proper care and still choose to neglect your animal that this becomes an issue of you just being cruel to your pets.

I once had a girl who was keeping her female rat alone in an aquarium. I was trying to educate her; it was clear she cared for the rat exponentially, said it aided her with her mental illness, but keeping rats alone is neglectful and an aquarium is not a proper home. She was neglecting her rat by not giving this intelligent, social animal proper companionship or a sufficient living space. It wasn’t that she didn’t love her rat! But that rat was still in a shitty situation for rats.

So this argument of “These people love and care for their outdoor cats, how can they be neglecting them?” Love isn’t enough, my friends. You have to be willing to put in the proper care. I’m sure people who try to turn their cats and dogs vegan love them very much, but we all know why that is harmful. You can love your animal and still be putting it in harm’s way, still neglecting it, still leaving it in an unhealthy situation.

isn’t he beautiful

listen to the SOUND when he bites

He is NOT, however, either the largest crocodile ever captured in Australia OR the largest ever in captivity.

A slightly larger crocodile has been reported (though not yet comfirmed) to have been captured at 5.58 meters.

And while the famous Brutus of the Adelaide River was estimated to be just slightly larger than Cassius at 5.5m, he was driven out of his territory by a younger and even larger crocodile, who as a result has been given the name, The Dominator.  He is estimated to be just over 6m.

This is Brutus, with an appropriate caption:

It is believed that he lost that arm in a fight with a Bull Shark.  

The Bull Shark lost.

THIS is the crocodile who kicked him out.  The Dominator:

And that’s STILL not the biggest.  

The largest living crocodile ever reliably measured was Lolong, who for the 1.5 years between his capture and his death was the largest crocodile ever held in captivity, at a whopping 6.17 meters (20 feet 3 inches) and 1075 kg (2,370 lbs).  He had been feeding on both humans and very large livestock in the Bunawan creek in Agusan del Sur in the Philippines.  It took 100 people all night to drag him to shore during his capture.

And here’s why:

Since then Brutus developed a habit of hunting and eating Bull Sharks.

Here’s him with a prey.

And if you thought that you’ll be safe if you just stay out of Australia then think again!

Meet Gustave the Nile Croc.

This crocodile became almost legendary for both it’s size and the habit of hunting both livestock AND humans.

So how big is Gustave?

No one is sure. Since he was NEVER captured.

His estimated size is of at least 5,5m  but some give him over 6m.

The terrifying parts are:

1) He is still growing having only about 60 years.

2) Adult crocodiles often perform a gesture of submission to him - something usually done by young crocodiles toward adults - Gustave is just THAT BIG.

3) His sheer size makes it difficult for him to catch agile prey Nile crocs tend to feed on - hence why he developed a habit of hunting either larger prey like Hippopotamus or creatures which are not good at spotting danger in the first place like livestock and humans.

And this is NOT ALL.

Gustave actually has a noticeable scars on his body - he was shot at east 3 times and stabbed with a spear or something similar at one occasion.

He lived to tell the tale - my question is:

What happened to that one dude who attacked Gustave with a spear?

THIS is Gustave:

And he is the PERFECT CROCODILE.  He is the perfect example of what I mean when I talk about (as I do) how the morphology of extremely large crocodiles adapts to the changing physics of their bite.

This is a typical adult Nile Crocodile:

And THIS is a god among his kind:

This is it, folks.  The Final Form.  THIS is what peak performance looks like.

Crocodiles and physics have an interesting relationship.  Crocodiles have, by a CONSIDERABLE MARGIN, the strongest bite of any animal on Earth.  EVER.  Scaled up estimates (based on Nile and Saltwater crocodiles) give the extinct Deinosuchus an estimated bite force MORE THAN DOUBLE the recently updated Tyrannosaurus bite estimates.  Living crocodiles have bite forces measured in the range of 5000 pounds per square inch, for an individual around 15-16 feet.  It is estimated that modern crocodiles in the range of 18-20 feet would have bit forces around 7-8000 psi or more.

That’s a problem.

Because a crocodile’s skull is only designed to handle so much pressure.  Go beyond that limit and the force of impact when those jaws snap shut could literally shatter their own skulls.

But evolution has spent hundreds of millions of years perfecting crocodiles, so PHYSICS ISN’T GOING TO STOP THEM.  What ends up happening in the skulls of these extremely large crocodiles is they will increase dramatically in mass to compensate for the increased forces.  A crocodile’s skull is almost exclusively solid bone, with only minimal space for nasal passages, a surprisingly advanced brain, and some slightly porous looking framework that helps the bone distribute the force over a larger area.  The effect is by far the most pronounced in Nile crocodiles, which most regularly feed on larger prey and need to make use of all that power.

Compare, 26 inch skull:

vs 29 inch skull:

Both of those are Nile crocodile skulls (or rather, replicas thereof).

And just for fun, here are the skulls of completely different (and very extinct species), Deinosuchus:

and Purussaurus:

The bigger the crocodile (within a given species), the more massive the skull needs to be to compensate for that UNBELIEVABLE bit pressure.  This is one way to see from a distance whether you are looking at a normal sized crocodile:

and a truly extraordinary individual:

One of the things about Gustave that’s so impressive is how healthy his teeth look.  A lot of large crocodiles, in their old age, have very worn down and often missing teeth.  They do replace them many times over a lifetime, but when they get very old this slows down.  Gustave, at least in every picture taken of him, had teeth that were in very good condition.

Even crocodiles much smaller than Gustave’s reported size (probably similar in size to Dominator or Lolong) tend to have smaller or more worn teeth:

than the pinnacle of his kind:

I have to meet with the state attorney later on this week because I had a patient who assaulted me and got arrested and charged with felony assault.

Thankfully I was not physically injured, but a male patient twice my size overpowered me, shut the door, refused to let me leave, and made suggestive comments. When I attempted to escape, he grabbed me by the shoulders and shoved me into the wall.

Don’t be complacent about safety in the workplace, especially when you work in the ER. We see the worst of people at times— drug addicts, drunks, criminals. It’s easy to think you’re safe in a busy ER with nursing staff and security. But anything can happen at any time.

These things may be common sense, but as a general reminder:

—Leave doors and curtains to exam rooms open unless it’s a patient privacy issue. If you have to close them, go in with a nurse or other staff member.

—Never let a patient get between you and the door.

—If you are evaluating a psych patient, alcohol intoxication, or otherwise altered patient, don’t go in alone, even with the door open.

—Have zero tolerance for verbally aggressive or abusive patients and let them know this behavior will not be tolerated.

—Be aware of a patient’s verbal cues and body language.

—Maintain personal space between you and the patient during the interview. Stand to the side. Don’t turn your back to them.

—If a patient gives you a bad feeling, LISTEN TO YOUR GUT. You can have your security guard or police officer (if you have one on staff) stand outside of the room for any future interactions, or alternatively, I have asked male providers to handle patients who have made me uncomfortable or have threatened me somehow. Don’t be afraid to do this. Sometimes as a woman in the ER I feel like I need to be “tough” and handle things on my own, but don’t let your pride or ego interfere with your personal safety.

—On that note, don’t be afraid of “overreacting” to a potentially dangerous situation with a patient. I should have immediately called for help or hit the code blue button the second this patient shut the door, but for some reason thought I could defuse the situation myself and didn’t want to exaggerate what was happening. But it took all of thirty seconds for the situation to escalate to violence.

—Always have somebody walk you out to your car, ideally a security guard.

In addition, I found this article on the ACEP website and thought it was very helpful and informative, if you have the time to read it: https://www.acep.org/uploadedFiles/ACEP/Meetings_and_Events/Educational_Meetings/EDDA/Phase_II/17%20Sanson%20-%20ED%20Safety%20and%20Security.pdf

If something ever does happen to you, PLEASE don’t downplay it or rationalize it. It’s crazy sometimes how we have to compartmentalize while working in the ER, and accept things that would never be acceptable in any other job. This incident happened at the beginning of my shift and then I just had to keep on working and pretend like I didn’t just have one of the scariest experiences of my life. And so many of my coworkers said things like, “it sucks, but it’s part of the job.”

In the end, I really had the urge to downplay the situation and considered NOT pursuing any action against this guy because I just wanted the situation to go away, but screw that. Violence against healthcare workers is a legitimate problem and hopefully the actions I take today will prevent this guy from doing something similar in the future.

JUST FUCKING LISTEN. 

THIS IS HALLOWEEN BUT NOT LIKE YOU KNOW IT

1. Pick a career that will pay more than ur student loan payments

Marbles are beautiful when they’re young, but are at high risk of developing tumours, especially if they have white scaling like my two babes did.

The first pictures show them tumour-free and then the second shows them with tumours. In both cases, the tumours started developing within the first few months of being home.

The female featured in the bottom set had to be humanely euthanized because the tumours on her back and peduncle eventually caused her to be unable to swim. This led to lethargy and loss of appetite, so I had to let her go.

The male featured above, currently still living at the time of writing this, is now experiencing lethargy. He had to be rehomed earlier the year due to a major move, and the new owner has let me know that the tumours he previously had are growing faster and bigger. It’s on his back and both sides. They’re trying some things to make him comfortable, but know that humane euthanasia may be required.

Marbles, just like true dragonscale and metallic bettas, are at higher risk of developing tumours than other varieties. You also see increased risk in “monster” bettas (typically blue bettas with a white face) and “koi” bettas (both monsters and kois are still marble bettas). “Fancy” bettas also tend to be marbles, but seem to usually be labelled this when they have more orangey and blue/green colours.

It’s interesting to note that I’ve seen tumour or cyst-like protrusions on two of my other bettas in the past as well, but they never developed as aggressively or in the same manner as those on the marbles:

It’s also interesting to note that in the two cases above, the protrusions both look similar in appearance and are on the same area of the body. In the red male above, he was dealing with a viral infection that had a host of other symptoms; the female, still currently living at the time of writing this, also seems to be dealing with – what I believe to be – a bacterial infection, given the condition of her fins as well. (She was rehomed along with the male marble above, so this picture was sent to me by the new owner.)

With marbles, tumours are believed to be caused by overactivity of iridophores; in the red veiltail and dumbo female, it seemed to stem from internal infections.

So, although I meant this to be a post about marbles, it also kind of turned into a tumour post as well, hah.

Health Managment Professor, on the importance of bring critical of journal articles  (via thismightgetruff)