Week 12: Halloween, Turtle Probe, and a Wedding
Updated: Nov 6, 2023
Week 12 started off with our first exam for the heme lymph and coagulation block! It was primarily focused on anemia with a good amount of immunology sprinkled in. The rest of Monday consisted of four lectures and an ethics discussion. The ethics discussion focused on cat and dog overpopulation and it was encouraging to see that the homeless pet problem is slowly declining, even after the spike after the pandemic. There was also an interesting lunch talk focused on allergies.
The main categories of allergies include, food, flea, and environmental allergies and the key to proper treatment and maintenance is understanding which of these categories your pet falls into.
Food allergies typically start around one year of age and about 20-30% of these cases end up with some sort of gastrointestinal symptom. It is important to know that this allergy can also flair up with the ingestion of medicine that has been flavored. The main way to differentiate this allergy category from the others is that it is non-seasonal meaning your pet may be itchy year-round. Food allergies can be addressed with a food trial where either a novel or hydrolyzed protein is introduced, and all other proteins are strictly avoided. We want to avoid BLTs (bites, licks, or tastes) of anything other than the new diet with the new protein. This process can be taxing and involve a solid amount of owner commitment but in the long run your pet’s comfort is worth it.
The next category is flea allergies. These pets are sensitive to the protein in the flea saliva and even one bite can make them extremely itchy. This allergy may appear seasonally (when fleas are most prevalent) and the animals may concentrate their area of scratching to the base of their tail / lumbar region. Flea allergies can be addressed by decontaminating the environment (house), pet (flea bath), and by using adequate flea medication (but make sure it is not flavored with something your pet is sensitive to if they also have food allergies).
The third category is environmental allergies and the root cause of these are sometimes harder to identify. Most pets will become affected anywhere from 6 months to 6 years with most happening around the 1-3 year range. Environmental allergies can be addressed with Apoquel, a tyrosine kinase inhibitor, or Cytopoint injections (monoclonal antibody). One interesting thing that was brought up was that the use of antihistamines has not been scientifically proven to help the symptoms that go along with environmental allergies.
While most of those allergy categories above were referring to dogs, it is also important to note that our feline friends also suffer from food, flea, and environmental allergies. Proper flea control is important even if your cat is an indoor only camper. Asthma and ringworm are also common issues that were brought up during this session.
Overall, this talk was an interesting way to learn more about the three main allergy categories and is good information to have in your back pocket. Monday night concluded with some pumpkin carving with my housemates!
Tuesday started off with three lectures on the adaptive immune system and continued with a team-based learning session focused on lymphocyte development. The rest of the afternoon consisted of Spanish class where we learned some horse terminology and then my housemates and I watched some Halloween shows and passed out candy to trick-or-treaters. Wednesday morning began with an awesome hematology lab where we manually ran a CBC. We made blood smears to do manual white blood cell counts, calculated PCV and TP and checked hemoglobin absorbance. We then compared our findings to the actual lab results and surprisingly, we were not too terribly off. This whole process was interesting to learn and it made me appreciate the manual cbc machines much more! The rest of the afternoon concluded with some studying and a swim at the rec pool.
Thursday started off with a nice long 9 mile run with Churro and a mentor meeting with Dr. Keller. During the meeting, Dr. Keller brought her two amazing box turtles and her adorable leopard gecko! We learned how do to physical exams on these little friends and even got to listen to their hearts with a doppler and pencil probe (turtle probe). We do not get much exposure to exotics in our traditional courses so this was an awesome experience and I am super grateful to have Dr. Keller as our mentor!
Friday started off with another team-based-learning session on adaptive immunity followed by two case-based lab sessions focused on analyzing blood work with leukocyte abnormalities. This was a great way to put our knowledge to test and demonstrate why the material we are learning now is important. After lab I hopped on a plane and made my way home for my cousin’s wedding!
Saturday morning my dad and I went on an awesome 10 mile run on one of our favorite trails and then my family headed up to Fallbrook to celebrate Maddie and Colin’s wedding. It was an amazing celebration filled with friends and family and I am so excited to see the life that they create together!
Sunday consisted of flying back to Davis, spending some time with my pup and studying.
Quote of the week: “I’m a lymphomaniac.” Dr. Vernau
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