The Vet Vault: Veterinary Career, Clinical Skills & Wellbeing

In part two of our bonus FIP series Dr Sally Coggins - feline vet and FIP researcher - tells us about other potentially useful treatments, like mefloquine for FIP. This could be particularly useful if you are not in Australia or the UK with access to BOVA's legally compounded Remdesivir and oral GS44152. We also cover off on side effects of Remdisivir, as well as the practicalities of the treatment period, like how to help clients with painful injections, and speak to a vet nurse who treated her own cat for FIP to get an owner's perspective. 

Joining us as co-host is Dr Dave Collins - medicine specialist and organiser of spectacular snow-based vet conferences with Vets On Tour. Start planning at https://www.vetsontour.com.au/

If you enjoy our clinical content then head to vvn.supercast.com for a free two-week trial of our large collection of podcasts in small animal medicine, surgery and emergency. Short enough to consume on your drive to work, but with enough content to make you just a little bit better (and more enthusiastic!) at your job, and backed up by beautiful show notes to refer back to later. 

This two-part bonus series is an update on everything FIP from our clinical podcast series. There have been some major changes in this space over the last few months, most notably around the legal access to Remdesivir for animal use and the availability of an oral formulation of GS442524 in Australia and the UK through BOVA compounding. In this episode, we go to the front lines of therapy to create the most up to date FIP guide out there. 

We speak to Dr Sally Coggins, a feline vet and FIP researcher at Sydney University, about what they are learning about feline infectious peritonitis treatment. In part one we learn how to confirm your diagnosis, and we dig deep into Remdesivir - the drug that changed it all. 

Our co-host for these episodes is Dr Dave Collins - a medicine specialist from Sydney and the genius behind Vets On Tour, which is a series of veterinary conferences held in some of the world's most spectacular places. If you fancy a bit of snow and apres-ski with your CPD you should check out https://www.vetsontour.com.au/. 

Go to vvn.supercast.com for a free two-week trial of our Medicine, ECC and Surgery podcasts. We know how hard it is to commit the time to sit down for ongoing CPD, and we know how quickly you start feeling rusty and that you're falling behind, which is why we think you’ll love these. Three episodes per week that will take you from 'unsure' to being a total boss, all in the space of your drive to work. Once you’re joined up you’ll be able to listen to all of our podcasts in exactly the same place that you normally listen to podcasts, including the Apple podcast player and Spotify. We’ll also send you beautifully made show notes with all of the good bits so you can refer back to it later. 

Robert Pope is a British veterinarian, athlete and charity fundraiser. He is an elite distance runner, with a number of successes at the marathon and ultramarathon distances, including being the Australian marathon champion in 2015. In 2016 he completed a 422-day, 15,700-mile run (that’s about 600 marathons!) comprising more than 4 complete crossings of the United States, and became the first person to trace the route run by Tom Hanks' fictional character in the film Forrest Gump.

Rob’s vet career includes a PhD, a long stint as an emergency vet, and journeys into Opthalmology and Imaging. Rob currently works at the Animal Trust - a not-for-profit veterinary company in the UK. 

He's the author of a new book about his Forrest Gump adventure - Becoming Forrest (https://bit.ly/BeMoreForrest), a TED speaker, and the host of the Red Bull Being Superhuman podcast. As you can imagine - we had a LOT to chat about, like making career decisions, keeping your head above water in the current craziness that is vet work just about everywhere in the world, about courage and grit, great life advice, and of course - about running. Lots and lots of running!

Go to https://thevetvault.com/podcasts/ for show notes and to check out our guests’ favourite books, podcasts and everything else we talk about in the show.

If you want to lift your clinical game, go to https://vvn.supercast.tech for a free 2-week trial of our short and sharp high-value clinical podcasts.

We love to hear from you. If you have a question for us or you’d like to give us some feedback please leave us a voice message by going to our episode page on the anchor app (https://anchor.fm) and hitting the record button, via email at [email protected], or just catch up with us on Instagram. (https://www.instagram.com/thevetvault/) 

And if you like what you heard then please share the love by clicking on the share button wherever you’re listening and sending a link to someone who you know will enjoy listening.

In this episode, we speak to Specialist Veterinary Clinical Pathologist Dr Brett Stone. Brett has extensive experience in both clinical pathology and histopathology. He has worked as a pathologist in Australia and the UK for over 15 years and has a special interest in cytology and immunocytochemistry. 

In our previous path episode with Dr Rebekkah Liffman, we talked about how to GET the perfect cytology sample. This time we’re going to look at it. And no - you shouldn’t just chuck it in one of those little blue boxes and send it on its merry way - you should have a look at it yourself. Tune in and you’ll hear why, and HOW. 

Brett starts with some great tips on how to get the most out of your microscope, and then gets onto the higher grade stuff, like what to look for, how to differentiate nasty from not so nasty, and how to plan your next steps, including deciding what samples you actually want to end up sending to the lab. 

Thank you to the SVS Pathology Network (https://www.vetqml.com.au/) for loaning Brett to us and for supporting this series of pathology episodes. Check out their other educational resources at the Clinical Excellence Support programme, which is a collection of pathology related continuing education talks, webinars and web content. (http://www.vetqml.com.au/NewsEvents/NewsEvents/EducationalVideos.aspx)

Go to https://thevetvault.com/podcasts/ for show notes and to check out our guests’ favourite books, podcasts and everything else we talk about in the show.

If you want to lift your clinical game, go to https://vvn.supercast.tech for a free 2-week trial of our short and sharp high-value clinical podcasts.

We love to hear from you. If you have a question for us or you’d like to give us some feedback please leave us a voice message by going to our episode page on the anchor app (https://anchor.fm) and hitting the record button, via email at [email protected], or just catch up with us on Instagram. (https://www.instagram.com/thevetvault/)

And if you like what you heard then please share the love by clicking on the share button wherever you’re listening and sending a link to someone who you know will enjoy listening.

“I am an old man and have known a great many troubles, most of which never happened.” Mark Twain

In episode 49 we dissected one of the biggest fears that many vets have: the fear of an official board complaint, from the perspective of a practitioner facing a complaint against them. In this episode, we look at the same issue from the side of the official body that deals with complaints. I’m a firm believer that the more we know about the things that we fear, the less scary they become, so let’s face this one together

Drs. Kate Clarke and Magdoline Awad are vets with experience serving on vet boards. They join us to answer all of our questions about board complaints - like how likely is it happen in the average career, what the most common complaints are, what the process looks like if you do have one lodged against you, as well as practical tips for avoiding them in the first place. Kate and Mags also walk us through all the possible outcomes, in other words - what's the worst that can happen, but then - what is the much more LIKELY to happen.

Kate has over 20 years experience as a GP vet in regional Australia and the UK, with membership of the Australian and New Zealand College of Veterinary Scientists in Small Animal Medicine and a Master’s degree in Business Administration. In addition to her role on Victoria’s Vet Board, she’s also the founding director of Engaged Solutions, a veterinary HR consultancy, and serves on the Australasian Veterinary Boards Council’s Sustainable Practice Committee. She's an AVA graduate mentor and a Policy Council Advisor for the AVA’s Veterinary Business Group, tasked with developing the AVA Great Workplaces Policy, and is also leading the development of a new not-for-profit called Sustainable Veterinary Careers. Somewhere in between all of that Kate also has a veterinarian husband and two teenage kids. 

Have your say at https://sustainableveterinarycareers.org by completing the survey. 

Mags is Chief Veterinary Officer at Greencross. (https://www.greencrossvets.com.au/) She did her memberships in animal welfare and has a degree in Veterinary Professional Practice Management. She was appointed to the Veterinary Practitioners Board of NSW in 2019, and is a member of the UNSW Animal Care and Ethics Committee and is the NSW representative for the AVA Welfare and Ethics special interest group. Between 2008-2015 Mags was Chief Veterinarian at RSPCA NSW, after starting with the organisation in 1996. She’s also been involved in the development and management of community programs in remote regional areas of NSW, working with local veterinarians and government to improve the welfare of pets in those communities. 

Go to https://thevetvault.com/podcasts/ for show notes and to check out our guests’ favourite books, podcasts and everything else we talk about in the show.

If you want to lift your clinical game, go to https://vvn.supercast.tech for a free 2-week trial of our short and sharp high-value clinical podcasts.

We love to hear from you. If you have a question for us or you’d like to give us some feedback please leave us a voice message by going to our episode page on the anchor app (https://anchor.fm) and hitting the record button, via email at [email protected], or just catch up with us on Instagram. (https://www.instagram.com/thevetvault/) 

And if you like what you heard then please share the love by clicking on the share button wherever you’re listening and sending a link to someone who you know will enjoy listening.

There are many things you do almost every day in your job as a clinical veterinarian, usually multiple times a day. Sometimes these things become so routine that you don’t even stop to think about what you do and how you do it, and whether there could potentially be better ways that will deliver better results. And you DEFINITELY never get around to asking the questions you’ve always wondered about.

Routine pathology sampling is high on this list. How do we ensure that we get good quality FNA smears that have the best chances of being diagnostic? Should you pull back on the plunger when you sample or just wiggle the needle around in there?  What can and can’t you FNA? (Did you know that you can get great results from FNA’ing bone pathology?!) What about blood sampling? Surely we can’t mess that up, can we?! And CSF? That’s just for the specialist centres, right? Maybe not. 

Our guest for this episode is Dr Rebekah Liffman. Rebekah is a clinical pathologist at ASAP laboratories in Victoria (http://www.asaplab.com.au/Home.aspx), which is one of the labs that make up the SVS Pathology Network. If you listened to our previous pathology episode with Dr Flaminia Coiacetto you’d know that YOUR  favourite local lab is probably also part of the SVS pathology network: Vetpath in western Australia and the NT, QML if you’re a  Queenslander, Vetnostics in New South Wales and the ACT,  TML in Tasmania, and ASAP laboratory in Victoria and South Australia. A big thank you to SVS for supplying us with the brains for this episode and for supporting this series of episodes.  

Go to https://thevetvault.com/podcasts/ for show notes and to check out our guests’ favourite books, podcasts and everything else we talk about in the show.

If you want to lift your clinical game, go to https://vvn.supercast.tech for a free 2-week trial of our short and sharp high-value clinical podcasts.

We love to hear from you. If you have a question for us or you’d like to give us some feedback please leave us a voice message by going to our episode page on the anchor app (https://anchor.fm) and hitting the record button, via email at [email protected], or just catch up with us on Instagram. (https://www.instagram.com/thevetvault/) 

And if you like what you heard then please share the love by clicking on the share button wherever you’re listening and sending a link to someone who you know will enjoy listening.

Courage. Grit. Persistence. Some might call it stubbornness. Whatever you call it - our guest for this episode has it in spades. Dr Mariana Pardo is an emergency and critical care specialist at the Veterinary Emergency Group, in Whiteplains, New York. She qualified as a vet in Santiago, Chile, in 2009, and then moved to the United States where she walked a long long road to the first female emergency and critical care specialist from Latin America - but I won’t ruin the story for you here - it’s a good one. 

Join in on our conversation with Mariana as she tells us about her journey and making brave moves, failure, dealing with, and overcoming bias, using imposter syndrome to your advantage, and much much more.  

Go to https://thevetvault.com/podcasts/ for show notes and to check out our guests’ favourite books, podcasts and everything else we talk about in the show.

We're also very privileged that Mariana has been helping us over on the clinical podcast with some incredible ECC content. We launched her first episode this week on sensible IV fluid choices. After 2 decades as a vet, I thought that THAT would be one thing that I’d mastered. I hadn't - sooo much to learn! And Mariana is a fabulous teacher. Go to vvn.supercast.tech for a free 2-week trial and search for Mariana’s episode on the emergency stream.

We love to hear from you. If you have a question for us or you’d like to give us some feedback please leave us a voice message by going to our episode page on the anchor app (https://anchor.fm) and hitting the record button, via email at [email protected], or just catch up with us on Instagram. (https://www.instagram.com/thevetvault/) 

And if you like what you heard then please share the love by clicking on the share button wherever you’re listening and sending a link to someone who you know will enjoy listening.

Yes. it's totally fine. In fact, it's the preferred way to send your spleens to the lab.

Here's another thing that I learnt from this episode: pathologists don't necessarily look like Uncle Fester from the Adams Family!

Join us with the very un-Uncle Fester-like anatomical pathologist Dr Flaminya Coiacetto for more things that you didn't know about how to ensure better histopath results. (And happier pathologists!) From sample handling, preparation and storage, to what the ideal history looks like. Minia also tells us about the common special stains: how they work and when to use them. 

If you enjoy listening to Flaminya you should check out her video on how to do a necropsy at https://www.vetnostics.com.au/our-services/educational-resources/.

Thank you the SVS Pathology Network (Vetnostics, QML, TML, Vetpath and ASAP labs for lending us their pathologist, and for supporting our new pathology series of podcasts.  

Go to https://thevetvault.com/podcasts/ for show notes and to check out our guests’ favourite books, podcasts and everything else we talk about in the show.

If you want to lift your clinical game, go to https://vvn.supercast.tech for a free 2-week trial of our short and sharp high-value clinical podcasts.

We love to hear from you. If you have a question for us or you’d like to give us some feedback please leave us a voice message by going to our episode page on the anchor app (https://anchor.fm) and hitting the record button, via email at [email protected], or just catch up with us on Instagram. (https://www.instagram.com/thevetvault/) 

And if you like what you heard then please share the love by clicking on the share button wherever you’re listening and sending a link to someone who you know will enjoy listening.

Thanks to Heska Australia for supporting this very important series of episodes on mental health, resilience, and burnout prevention. Go to https://www.heska.com.au to find out about ways to re-imagine the way you run your in house labs and digital radiography. 

Professor Gordon Parker AO is Scientia Professor of Psychiatry at the University of NSW. He is, amongst other things, founder of the Black Dog Institute, and Director of the Division of Psychiatry at Prince of Wales and Prince Henry Hospitals. In 2004 he received a Citation Laureate as the Australian Scientist most highly cited in Psychiatry/Psychology, and in 2018 he was a finalist for NSW Senior Australian of the Year. Oh, and that little AO that I read after his name is short for 'Order of Australia', which is awarded for distinguished service of a high degree to Australia or humanity at large.  He has published 20 books and over 1000 scientific papers, with his most recent book publication 'Burnout - A Guide to Identifying Burnout and Pathways to Recovery'. This book encapsulates groundbreaking new research and clarifies what exactly burnout is, what it isn’t, what the risk factors are, how to spot it, prevent it, and fix it. 

And these are exactly the topics that we cover in this conversation with Prof Parker. We’re well aware that our profession is one of the highest risk professions for burnout, so arming ourselves with a better understanding of this nemesis is critical. 

Burnout: A guide to identifying burnout and pathways to recovery: https://www.allenandunwin.com/browse/books/general-books/health-fitness/Burnout-Gordon-Parker-Gabriela-Tavella-and-Kerrie-Eyers-9781760878061

Go to https://thevetvault.com/podcasts/ for the show notes and to check out our guests’ favourite books, podcasts and everything else we talk about in the show.

If you want to lift your clinical game, go to https://vvn.supercast.tech for a free 2-week trial of our short and sharp high-value clinical podcasts.

We love to hear from you. If you have a question for us or you’d like to give us some feedback please leave us a voice message by going to our episode page on the anchor app (https://anchor.fm) and hitting the record button, via email at [email protected], or just catch up with us on Instagram. (https://www.instagram.com/thevetvault/) 

And if you like what you heard then please share the love by clicking on the share button wherever you’re listening and sending a link to someone who you know will enjoy listening.