The class will be divided into Group A, Group B, and Group C for labs.
Each clinical lab is 4 hours long. These clinical sessions are laboratories, not clinical rotations, as student preparation and involvement is not expected to be at the level of a clinical rotation in this introductory course, and students will work more as a group than as individuals.
The first two clinical labs are formative while the last two clinical labs will have summative assessments, graded via a rubric on Examsoft.
On each clinical lab, students shadowto clinician doing consultations on companion animal medicine, surgery and emergency services at the Small Animal Clinic. Students collect historical data from clients in a clinical setting, perform physical exam, generate prioritized problem list and discuss prioritized differential diagnoses using the DAMNIT-V scheme. Students develop comprehensive diagnostic plans and get signed consent from clients. Students work with clinicians to write/discuss discharge instructions with plans. Student assist with writing medical records/SOAPs for patients. Students are involved with management of hospitalized patients, which may include administering medications, performing medical math and assessing pain scale where appropriate. Students will also participate in rounds.
A new component of the course involves students participating in 3 ophthalmology lectures and one ocular lab at the SIM Lab/Small Animal Clinic with small animal faculty/staff geared toward improving students clinical exposure to ophthalmology.
.In total, each student will participate in 5 lectures (1 course overview/intro lecture, 1 lecture on small animal modules, 3 lectures on clinical ophthalmology by a Board Certified VP ophthalmologist) 16 hours of clinical labs at the Small Animal Clinic (8 lecture hours) and 4 hours of ocular examination labs at the SIM Lab/Small Animal Clinic using eye models and/or live patients (2 lecture hours).
This course's 1 credit/15 lecture hours are distributed as five lectures and 20 hours of lab.