Last week Liesbeth travelled down to Swindon for two courses on feline medicine as part of a two-year programme to obtain a certificate in feline medicine.
The first course was on clinical pathology and laboratory diagnosis, held by Kathleen Tennant (BVetMed Cert SAM Cert VC PGCAP FRCPath MRCVS), the clinical lead in charge of the diagnostic laboratories at Langford Veterinary Services. As well as having a huge wealth of knowledge and letters after her name Kathleen was also an excellent speaker on the diagnostics Veterinarians can perform in house. We are currently lucky enough to have in house blood analysis machines which can provide the majority of tests we require on a day-to-day basis, meaning results are quickly available for our patients. Some more specialized tests have to be sent out to our external laboratory and this course provided information on obtaining the best samples and the most up-to-date information on what can be achieved from these samples.
The second day was spent on feline critical care and emergency case management. The speaker, Nicola Grint (BVSc PhD DVA DipIECVAA MRCVS), is a European Specialist in Veterinary Anaesthesia and Analgesia. Common toxicities in feline patients and the treatments and critical care that are required were covered. As a specialist in anaesthesia and analgesia she also spoke excellently on feline pain management and the use of anaesthetics for emergency patients. The afternoon was spent on CPR of cats. Fortunately in practice we only have to provide CPR for a small number of seriously ill patients which is why it’s even more important to keep up to date on consensus guidelines in this area. The day ended by covering blood transfusions in feline patients, which can be particularly tricky compared to canine patients.
Next month the course covers dermatology and urinary disease of cats, two of our most encountered problems in our feline friends!
