#uiucvetmed

[dr-sweetnlowe]

Due to the changes made to our schedules because of the coronavirus, I just had my last patient in the University of Illinois Veterinary Teaching Hospital....unless I get called in again between now and 8pm... I belong to the anesthesia service until 8pm when my on call shift ends. I had just thrown in a load of laundry when I got a call from one of the interns on ER telling me that there was a ferret that we needed to do an exploratory surgery on. We suspected maybe some kind of obstruction/foreign body. It was my first time anesthetizing a ferret, first time (successfully) intubating a ferret, and my last time working on a live patient in this hospital. Unfortunately due to the poor prognosis once they got inside the abdomen we had to euthanize the ferret. As much as I would have loved for her to make it and I could have my last case be a success, it was in her best interest. It’s been a wild ride so far and even more wild recently. My last 6 weeks (starting two weeks from now) are still up in the air so stay tuned for that. . . . . . . . . . . #dogtoremilytobe #vetstudent #vetmed #almostdoctor #61days #lastcase #emilyout #uiucvetmed (at University of Illinois College of Veterinary Medicine) https://www.instagram.com/p/B9w_mQQlKPL/?igshid=1epf65z0nt7q2

[lilprobablyfarm]

Misty had an incredibly rough night last night. While eating dinner, she began to choke. I called the emergency vet med school near us and they sent a Dr. (and students) out to help. They had to sedate her and put a tube down her throat to get rid of the blockage and after about 4' of tube, it finally cleared. She's now resting, with a terribly sore throat and a very messy coat. #scary #mistythellama #llama #uofivetmed #uiucvetmed #farmlife (at Lil Probably Farm) https://www.instagram.com/p/BtbhfYYFRz0/?utm_source=ig_tumblr_share&igshid=a0om9o9j2v6e

[dr-sweetnlowe]

I’m not sure how this happened, but I had my literal first time being called in while I was on call last night. Yeah, somehow I made it all the way to halfway through U block (my 21st block) without being called in. I figured it would happen eventually and it did. Earlier in the day my classmate who was 1st on call (I was backup) alerted me that there were two down dogs in our ER that would likely go to surgery tonight. A few hours later, I get a phone call saying we have the second back dog and a foreign body. Since they needed to wait until the first one finished to start the second back, I helped with the foreign body gastrotomy. Turned out to be a load of carpet, houseplants, and some rice??? Here’s to another week of anesthesia and hoping that it won’t be as crazy as we expect it to be 😬 . . . . . . . . . . #dogtoremilytobe #vetmed #vetstudent #anesthesia #oncall #emergencysurgery #guessmyluckranout #wearfigs @wearfigs #uiucvetmed https://www.instagram.com/p/B6-xe-cli6P/?igshid=bxllexdp9ris

[dr-sweetnlowe]

Apparently we just recently hit 100 days until graduation. 100 days until myself and many (so many #classzilla) of my classmates become doctors. Hours of studying, hours of paperwork, hours of being one of 90,000 people doing 8am treatments in the ICU, hours of not seeing the outside world with the sun up, hours of feeling not smart enough when clinicians ask us questions and we don’t have all of the answers right away, and hours of doing our best. We may still have days when we don’t have all the answers, but think about how many days we had no answers a few years ago? Today my patient had a gastrosplenic entrapment with about a foot of necrotic bowel. If you asked me to even give you a general idea of what that was 4 years ago I prob would’ve panicked. It’s been such a wild ride so far, and honestly it’ll only get more wild from here. What’s another 100ish days when I’ve been in school for over 20 years? . . . . . . . . . . . #dogtoremilytobe #vetstudent #vetmed #soclose #100days #almostthere #uiucvetmed @wearfigs #wearfigs #iknowallofmyselfieslookthesame #theresonlyonespotinmyapartmentthathasgoodlighting https://www.instagram.com/p/B8P5oZ5FXJv/?igshid=10xxf9d1tl9pk

[dr-sweetnlowe]

The original plan was to post this on my last day in the University of Illinois Veterinary Teaching Hospital. Plans have changed, and ClassZilla had their last day in the clinic without knowing it at the end of the first week of our three week last block. So I figured I would still post this on my would-be last day of Z block....and then I had no concept of time and forgot so I’m posting it today - the would be first day of my last 6 weeks of being a student forever. I’ll still be doing various things to learn (required to graduate) for this period of time, just at home. Although our graduation ceremony to celebrate this damn long journey to become doctors has been cancelled/postponed, regardless we will still be graduating as DVMs. Even though I won’t get the chance to be hooded by a very special intern, I’d like to give her a shoutout for always making me feel loved, special, and like I’m doing a good job. Every “can I just take you with me to every rotation?” And “you’re the BEST” meant so much to me (@chelseyyyy26 dat you, at least I’ll always have the memory of asking you during one of our many ER shifts together ❤️) Although on the bright side, I won’t be tortured with pomp and circumstance again and I won’t be sweating an enormous amount in these very heavy and thiccccc gown. The past four years have been kind of a wild ride for us so it’s not a big surprise that our last few weeks get tossed around and changed last minute. A huge thank you to the doctors and technicians who I’ve been lucky to work with both inside and outside of the VTH. I appreciate all of the support and the sass over the past year(s) while I was working alongside all of you! Every little word of encouragement, even if it was just complimenting my paperwork or letting me do things on my own, it all helped make the difficulty of fourth year easier. I wish I could be in there helping you all now! “Every day when I came in to work all I wanted to do was leave. So why in the world does it feel so hard to leave right now?” - Darryl Philbin (The Office, S9 E25) . . . . . . . . . . #dogtoremilytobe #vetmed #vetstudent #uiucvetmed #dvm #dogtor #8yearslater #coronaviruscantstopus #Classzilla https://www.instagram.com/p/B-XEnW2FlxI/?igshid=yogrov32w1oc

[dr-sweetnlowe]

Four years ago this nugget didn’t know the other nugget, but we were nervously interviewing to become vet students. Now these two nuggets are 88 days from being veterinarians and helped interview potential vet students! Today we spent about 9 hours at the U of I for Interview Day. We sat in a group consisting of one faculty member, one alumni clinician, and one senior student (that’s us!). I like to think we helped these future students feel comfortable here, and gave them hope that graduating is possible 👩🏻‍⚕️ . . . . . . . . . . #dogtoremilytobe #almostvets #almostdoctors #uiucvetmed #interviewday2020 #lookhowfarwevecome (at University of Illinois College of Veterinary Medicine) https://www.instagram.com/p/B8r86DDl3ge/?igshid=deriee6naiew

[dr-sweetnlowe]

Block V was cardiology! We had endless chronic valve disease (CVD) dogs, dilated cardiomyopathy (DCM), hypertrophic cardiomyopathy (HCM), heart failure, rechecks, new appointment, an arrhythmogenic right ventricular cardiomyopathy (ARVC) or “boxer cardiomyopathy”, a patent ductus arteriosus (PDA) surgery, some pacemakers, and more. We worked on ECGs, talked about congenital heart problems, and various heart meds. It was easily the SAS-iest group I have ever had the pleasure to spend 2 weeks with, but we all worked together and helped each other out and learned a lot. And bonus, I even remembered some things I learned on my off campus cardiology rotation from July 😱 And of course on top of this we had to suffer through waiting for loan money, NAVLE scores, and job opportunities. Now onto my last ever large animal rotation! (We had 6 students on our rotation, but 3 had to take personal days to leave us on our last day, so we had to send this to them to make sure they still saw our faces today) . . . . . . . . . . #dogtoremilytobe #vetmed #vetstudent #veterinarycardiology #cardiology #uiucvetmed #hearts #vetmedjokes #SASstandsforSubAorticStenosis https://www.instagram.com/p/B7uUZKnliHJ/?igshid=12djqis5gz62z

[dr-sweetnlowe]

The NAVLE gods have spoken #imgonnabeadoctor . . . . . . . . . . #dogtoremilytobe #vetmed #vetstudent #nomoreexams #imfree #uiucvetmed #navle #passed https://www.instagram.com/p/B7ooMB8lsU-/?igshid=1q7c0eri9fvdv

[dr-sweetnlowe]

Do you ever just lay on the floor while your dog checks to make sure you’re alive and ok? While it wasn’t the craziest of blocks, Block U Anesthesia is over and I am happy to be laying on my floor and have my dog think I’m a weirdo. Most days we all had 1-2 cases a day (11 students), and then we had some of us get called in for emergency surgeries or have to stay late for ones still going after 5pm. Luckily the anesthesia team members I worked with were supportive and nice, and I think we all learned a lot this block. My cases ranged from a quick esophagostomy tube placement, to dental procedures, to foreign body surgery, to a radius/ulna fracture repair, to some CTs and MRIs, and even a back dog. I had cats, dogs, old, young, and in between. At the U of I we also will have a split block (anesthesia and internal medicine), so it’ll be interesting to see how my split block goes when I have anesthesia again in March! Now onto a weekend of laying on the floor (and the couch!) with my snuggly dog, and mentally preparing myself for being on the first rotation with real client communication since October 😬😬😬 . . . . . . . . . . #dogtoremilytobe #vetmed #vetstudent #sometimesyoujusthavetolayonthefloor #anesthesia #veterinaryanesthesia #vetmed #uiucvetmed #17moreweeks https://www.instagram.com/p/B7KEcfEFvj3/?igshid=1wxnxsnl77rh1