Veterinary Ramblings Veterinary Ramblings

Join us as we chat with Laura Jones RVN about her life as a veterinary nurse, her hobbies, and her passion for internal medicine.

Laura shares her journey to becoming a veterinary nurse and the importance of nurses to the veterinary team and client relations. Outside of work, Laura is an adrenaline junkie who loves to drag race and explains what this courageous hobby involves and how it helps her switch off from work.

We also delve into the impact of the pandemic on the veterinary industry and client expectations. Laura tells us about how she accidentally ventured into internal medicine and how it has become her niche. She shares her different responsibilities and how they contribute to providing quality care for pets.

We pose a difficult question to Laura: what does the quality of life mean and how does it differ between clients and their pets? Laura provides insightful answers and highlights the need for both clients and practitioners to improve their perception of veterinary nursing.

In addition, Laura takes on our 60-second CPD challenge and delivers a fantastic run-down of the six things you need to do during nurse clinics for chronic disease patients. She also asks us to reflect on the circumstances that could be behind difficult behaviour between colleagues and clients.

If you're interested in learning more about Laura and her work, head over to her website https://www.veterinaryinternalmedicinenursing.com/. 
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This week we are joined by the fantastic Dr Russell Chandler! 

Russell graduated from the University of Bristol Veterinary School and has a self-confessed addiction to learning! He has studied various post-graduate qualifications including the RCVS Certificate in Small Animal Orthopaedics, an MSc in Orthopaedic Engineering and RCVS Advanced Practitioner in Small Animal Orthopaedics.

His current clinical interests are multimodal osteoarthritis management and regenerative medicine and he is currently studying for an MSc in stem cells and regeneration at the University of Bristol.

Russell explains why he thinks imposter syndrome is such an issue for veterinary professionals and how it works in conjunction with the scientific discipline.

As someone addicted to learning, we discuss one of Russell's degrees in orthopaedic engineering. We ask: what exactly does that mean? How did he find it as a veterinarian working with human surgeons? And how has it impacted his work?

We then discuss his work combining orthopaedic work with stem cells and regenerative medicine. Russell explains what stem cells are and how they can be used in a way that's very easy to understand and summarises all of the things you need to know about stem cell therapy in this week's 60-second CPD.  

Lastly, Russell talks about his work with the Veterinary Orthopaedic Alliance and the importance of practising gratitude in both your professional and personal life.
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 Dr Mike Davies graduated from the Royal Veterinary College, University of London, in 1976. He owned his own veterinary practice for more than 11 years and has worked in academia and in the pet food and pharmaceutical industries.

Mike has postgraduate Certificates in Veterinary Radiology and Small Animal Orthopaedics and a Diploma in Small Animal Clinical Nutrition. He published one of the first books on Veterinary Geriatrics and has also published numerous papers. 

Mike is an RCVS Specialist in Small Animal Clinical Nutrition and has always been a very active member of the BSAVA, attending his first Congress when he was a student in the 1970s.

We find out how Mike's upbringing influenced his decision to become a vet and how one lecture changed the trajectory of his career from zoology to nutrition. Mike obtained his fellowship for the RCVS, despite being examined by his competitors and doing a very tricky exam (not for the reasons you may think!)

As Mike has had a long career, we discuss the benefits of working in the veterinary practice, how the profession has changed over the years and the problems we're facing that affect the service we can provide to our clients. Mike offers up his solutions to the problems our industry is facing and delivers a fantastic 60 Second CPD entitled 'Lack Of Knowledge About Clinical Nutrition In  Veterinary Practice'

We then reflect on how we assess the nutrition of our pregnant pets and discuss how nutrition deficiency creates unexpected problems for our client's pets. Lastly, we discuss the guidelines for 'complete' pet food and the consequences for other animals, and humans,  when people chose a raw food diet for their pets 
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Join us as we sit down with the wonderful Caroline Murray,  an international veterinary locum and adventure traveller who is also known as The Wilderness Vet!

We begin our conversation by discussing Caroline's adventures in Mongolia and the action-packed, yet surprisingly modern lives of the nomadic people she travelled with. 

Caroline tells us which careers she considered before she decided to become a  veterinarian and how she was fortunate enough to take part in a research scholarship which developed her wanderlust.  

Caroline is such a positive person, however, things haven't always been that way. Her research into NLP (Neuro-Linguistic Programming) changed her life after she faced a lot of adversities regarding her health and wellness.  She summarises the alternative pain management methods that can help you in this week's 60 Second CPD: Pain & The Brain. 

Lastly, Caroline tells us about her time working with chimpanzees, and the unintended (hilarious) effect that had when working with more traditional patients and we spent some time discussing one of her favourite charities: Sanaga-Yong Chimpanzee.


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 Laura joins us for the second time after smashing the Guinness World Record for tandem cycling, covering 18,000 miles in 180 days with her husband Stevie! On their way, they raised money for VetLife, Mind and Sustrans. You can still support them by heading over to stelatandem.com.

We catch up on her amazing, but sometimes dangerous, world trip and find out about all the wonderful places they visited in Laura's 60-second CPD.  A true challenge in every sense of the word, we hope you find her story as inspiring as we did. If you would like to learn how why she did this, and how she and Stevie prepared for an adventure of a lifetime, catch up on her first episode of Episode 75 of Veterinary Ramblings.
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Merry Christmas Ramblers!

We're blown away by the year that we've had. If you follow us on social media you might have seen that we've had one of the best years on record, and we're so thrilled that our following is going strong. 

We wanted to celebrate the end of 2022 with some of our favourite stories from this year, where we revisit some of our favourite moments with guests - including some awesome life stories, some fascinating research and veterinary work, some thought-provoking conversations that changed our perspective and a few of the biggest laughs that we've had this year. 

We hope you enjoy, and we look forward to producing new content for you all next year!

Bring on 2023 - may your dog go with you!
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