December Post - A day at my mentorship

Yesterday at my mentorship (12/13/14), I did a lot of things, which is not usual. It was probably on of the most interesting days that I have had at the Loma Linda Animal Hospital. I helped the nurses with a lot of treatments of animals, including giving them injections and giving them IV fluids. I also helped the nurses to perform surgeries including one on a snake. I learned a lot today, including what happens to a dog when it contracts cancer and how to perform surgery on a eye of a snake. I hope to have more days that I do these types of things with the nurses and my mentor. I hope to learn more throughout my time at the Loma Linda Animal Hospital. Below I put pictures of the snake we performed surgery on and the Pomeranian I was giving 3cc of Nutrical vitamin to. You could read more about what I did under the link "Senior Project Hours."

Snake we performed surgery on.

The Pomeranian I gave Nutrical vitamin to using a syringe.

November Post - Feeling like I made a difference

When I went to my mentorship last saturday at the Loma Linda Animal Hospital there was a dog that was really sick. I really didn't know much about what happened to it, but I just continued cleaning the kennels and caring for the other animals. When I finished cleaning in one part of the hospital, I went to go check on all of the animals because my mentor said I should do that every time I have the chance. All of the animals were fine except for the one dog I was talking about earlier. It was in the surgery kennels and it appeared that he wasn't moving and I thought "Oh my gosh I think this dog passed away and no one knows." I saw a nurse pass by and I immediately told her what I saw. She observed the dog and shouted, "CODE BLUE." Code blue means that an animal just passed away or an emergency. Dr. Sigdestad (my mentor) came into the room running including other nurses and I left so I wouldn't get in the way of what they were doing. They put a note on the dog saying what happened and the nurse that I had told that the dog appeared to not be moving told me, "I really appreciate you telling me about the dog immediately after you became aware of what happened and continue to do that whenever you come to the animal hospital. We really appreciate your help." I felt like I made a difference in letting them know what happened, but I felt sad that we weren't able to save that dog beforehand. I have been learning so much from my mentorship and events like this happen every day at the Loma Linda Animal Hospital.

Blog 10: EQ

1. I reviewed the rule of three for writing an EQ.

2. a) This does meet the rule of three because it follows the three rules, but it doesn't feel like a strong EQ.
    b) This does meet the rule of three because it provides a framework, is specific, and takes a stance.
    c) This does not meet the rule of three because it doesn't provide a framework and the format doesn't feel right, but you could take a stance because this question is based on opinion.
    d) This does meet the rule of three because it provides a framework, takes a stance, and is specific. This sounds like a strong EQ.

3. How can a veterinarian best handle a pet during a visit so it won't be uncomfortable?

Blog 9: Lesson 1 Reflection

1. I am proud that I talked in front of my peers for about 9 minutes without getting nervous and that I made a lot of eye contact unlike other presentations in the past.

2. I would give myself a P for this presentation because I felt like I met all the P requirements including referencing my mentorship throughout my presentation, application of research, and professionalism. I would not give myself higher because I do not believe I went above and beyond in my presentation.

3. What worked was that I was able to engage my audience and I talked about my research that I wanted to present in my given amount of time.

4. What I would have done differently in my presentation if I were able to travel back in time is not depend on my notes as much because I felt like I was reading off my notes at times throughout my presentation.

Blog 8 - Research and Working EQ

   1. How can a veterinarian best prepare himself or herself for the struggles in the field including   euthanasia and stress?

     2. How can a veterinarian best prepare himself or herself for the struggles in the field including euthanasia and stress?

·      A veterinarian can get experience beforehand, for example volunteering at an animal hospital or animal shelter, and see how it’s like.

·      Veterinarians have to be able to control their emotions and not let that get in the way of work; this is a quality that vet students need to learn early on.

·      Veterinarians should be able to prioritize their responsibilities, for example work, family, money, and necessities, and not let one take over the other. Stress is a topic that has been discussed at veterinary schools often and at veterinary conferences.

    3. The most important source I have used to help me come up with my answer for my working EQ is a combination of different articles and this book called Tell Me Where It Hurts: A day of humor, healing, and hope in my life as an animal surgeon by Dr. Nick Trout. It has showed me in detail what a veterinarian goes through every day, specifically an animal surgeon.

     4.  My mentor is Dr. Leonard Sigdestad and I am doing my mentorship at the Loma Linda Animal Hospital. What I do helped me come up with my EQ. Many days I see Dr. Sigdestad run all over the place and talk to owners one after the other non stop throughout the whole day and he even has to stay after hours to perform surgeries and attend owners who weren’t attended during hospital hours. I wanted to know how he deals with all the stress he goes through every day and how he still enjoys his job taking care of animals. This helped me figure out one part of my EQ. One day, I had to help one of the nurses euthanize a dog and that was probably the saddest thing I have experienced in my life. I never knew they would let me do that and I thought how do the euthanize animals day after day without getting affected by it, which is what helped me figure out the second part of my EQ.

October Post - My First Injection To An Animal

Today I went to my mentorship and I did all the stuff I usually do. I cleaned the kennels, I walked the dogs, I helped with treatments of animals, did the laundry and swept, but later on one of the nurses asked me, "Do you want to inject this cat for me?" I got so excited because this was the first time I have ever injected an animal and of course I said yes. A few weeks ago the nurses taught me how to put the medication into a syringe so I was prepared to do that, but never did I think they were going to let me inject an animal. At first I was nervous to do this because I didn't know whether I was going to put it in right or the animal was going to react crazy, but everything went fine. I felt like an actual veterinarian and I feel like they trust me to do treatments and injections with the animals. Hopefully later on I get to experience more, but today was an exciting day for me. I have learned a lot from my mentorship at the Loma Linda Animal Hospital.

Blog 7: Independent Component 1 Approval

1. What I plan to do for my 30 hours is work at another animal hospital called the Chino Veterinary Hospital. I believe at first I might be doing office work, but later on I might be able to work with the veterinarian.

2. What I will do to show proof of my 30 hours is bring in my paycheck, but cross out the amount I have earned and any personal information. I also plan to ask the veterinarian I am working for to write a letter saying I have completed this amount of hours.

3. I want to see what the veterinarian at the Chino Veterinary Hospital does every day because not all veterinarians are the same. I want to step in the shoes of different veterinarians so I could learn and experience more from each of them. I believe this will help me learn more for my topic.

September Post - Research Books

While looking for books at the library for my research, I found 2 books in particular that have helped me better understand veterinary medicine and what veterinarians do everyday. The first book is called Tell Me Where It Hurts: A day of humor, healing, and hope in my life as an animal surgeon by Dr. Nick Trout. What I liked about this book was that the author goes in detail about what he does every hour of the day, the emotions he feels, and what he encounters. I recommend this book to veterinary medicine students and whoever is doing Veterinary Medicine for their Senior Project. The second book is called Vault Guide to Veterinary and Animal Careers by Liz Stewart. What I liked about this book was that it described the different kinds of career paths a veterinary medicine student can go into from private practice to Zookeeper. I really enjoyed reading these 2 books and I hope to find more like these throughout my senior project.

Blog 6 - Second Interview Preparation

1. My mentor is Dr. Leonard Sigdestad and he works at the Loma Linda animal hospital.

2. Questions I will ask him:
    - When was the Loma Linda animal hospital established?
    - How did you come to work at the animal hospital?
    - Did you work anywhere else before you started working at the Loma Linda animal hospital?
    - What college and graduate school did you attend?
    - Are any of your family members veterinarians?
    - When did you move to California?
    - What is the reason why you moved to California to work as a veterinarian instead of where you          grew up at (South Dakota)?

Blog 5 - Mentorship Reflection

1. Finding my mentorship was very difficult to do and I stressed a lot because of this. I had to call about 30 animal hospitals until 1, which is Loma Linda Animal Hospital, allowed me to do my mentorship at their hospital. The reason why I had to call so many was because some animal hospitals didn't allow volunteers due to insurance issues and the rest allowed volunteers, but the age limit to be a volunteer was 18 and over at those hospitals. I am grateful that Loma Linda Animal Hospital allowed me to do my mentorship there and now I am learning so much about veterinary medicine that I never knew before.

2. The most important article I have read so far was "Compassionate Vet Care: Handling Pets in a Pet Friendly Manner" by Dr. Sophia Yin, DVM. The reason why it is so important is because the info in this article is really important to know if I want to become a veterinarian when I am older. It describes how a veterinarian's care and how they handle an animal really affects the animal in a good or bad way. Veterinarians must put an animal's welfare first if they want to be a successful veterinarian.

August Post - Eye-Opening Experience

Today was my 5th day volunteering at the Loma Linda Animal Hospital and I have seen and learned so many things in these past few days. I work in the back with the nurses preparing animals for surgery, preparing dogs to go back with their owners, cleaning kennels, doing treatments for animals and several more things. I enjoy volunteering at the hospital because I get to interact with the nurses there and with the animals. I have seen many things at the animal hospital that I have never experienced before, including some that were unpleasant. I honestly thought that being a veterinarian was going to be playing with cats and dogs all day, feeding them and taking care of them, but I was completely wrong.

CAUTION DO NOT KEEP READING IF SQUEAMISH.

The worst thing that I have probably seen there was a dog's intestines hanging out of his body because he bit off his stitches after the surgery. The reason this happened was because the owners did not put a dog cone on him after the surgery was performed. Another thing that I have experienced that disgusted me was a dog's eye popping out of its head. I don't know how this could have happened because the dog came into the hospital when I was leaving. Other things I have seen include a cat's spine broken, deep wounds on a dog, and a dog's paw partially ripped off with deep wounds all over his body. The saddest experience I've had at the hospital was helping one of the nurses euthanize a dog due to aggression. I am surprised that I didn't react disgusted in front of the nurses or started crying when I saw those things.

DISTURBING PART DONE

On the other hand I saw many different animals that I didn't expect to see at the animal hospital. I saw a ferret, a tiger, a goat, and a rabbit. I am so glad I got to experience what it's like to be a veterinarian and I hope to learn more in the future. I was not allowed to take pictures inside of the hospital due to having to get the permission from the animals' owners to take the pictures ,but here is a picture of the outside of the Loma Linda Animal Hospital.

Blog 4: Interview Preparation

1. I plan to interview my mentor, Dr. Leonard Sigdestad from the Loma Linda Animal Hospital. I want to interview him first because I want to get closer to my mentor because right now we don't really talk much and also because I want to see how he feels about being veterinarian. I want to see his point of view of what being a veterinarian is really like.

2. Other questions I plan to ask:

• What college/university did you graduate from?
• Why did you want to become a veterinarian?
• What helped you deal with stressful patients and what you encountered(euthanasia, extremely hurt animals, stress overall at work)?
• How is your point of view now different from what it was when you first worked at an animal hospital/clinic?
• How much money do you earn?
• What is some advice you can give to students who want to become veterinarians or who barely graduated college/university as veterinarians?

Blog 3: Topic Choice and Working EQ

1. My topic is Veterinary Medicine.

2. How can a veterinarian best prepare himself or herself for the struggles in the field including euthanasia and stress?

3. Working Bibliography under links.

Summer Mentorship Component

1.https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/19cDoCC0asDlcs6fP18MtP1GywRD5Eqx_dxg_jEK7tHo/edit#gid=0
2. Montclair Clinica Medica Familiar
    Phone number: (909)626-4020
3. What level of education do you need to have (minimum) to be a nurse at a clinic or an assistant at the front desk?
4. The most important thing I gained from this experience is having everything organized from paperwork to files because in the office organization is key to getting everything done neatly and fast. I like office work and it was important for me to gain more experience of this, which I got from the clinic I worked at.
5. My senior topic is going to be veterinary medicine. What I did is a lot different from what my senior topic is going to be and the reason why is because I don't want to do office work all of the time. I want to do something that is hands on and I actually get to interact with people and animals. I really want to volunteer at an animal hospital or a shelter and I plan to do that for my senior topic. Volunteering at this clinic helped me realized that I don't want to pursue a topic in this area.

Blog 1: 2-Hour Presentations

1. What presentations did  you see?

•     Archaeology- Alicia Garcia
•     Gracie Jiu Jitsu- Bryan Posada
•     Photography Galleries- Viviana Bravo
•     Forensic Science- Arianna Castellanos
•     Video Game Graphic Design- Patrick Montoya
•     Firefighting- Steven Robles
•     Music Performance- Samantha Torres
•     Microbiology- Vanessa Machuca
•     Piano- Alyssa Casey
•     Hippotherapy- Clancy Raines
•     Biochemistry(Biofuels)- Christine Navarro
•     Marketing Management- Vanessa Pacheco
•     Hip Hop Dance Choreography- Mark Patena
•     Marriage and Family Therapy- Jorge Mancilla
•     Organic Architecture- Cheyenne Capener
•     Marine Biology- Felicia Stears 

2. What questions do you have that haven't been answered about the senior project? This can be about the senior project in general, any components or about a presentation topic you saw or what they said. 

What is being graded during your senior presentation?

If you don't pass your senior presentation what do you do?

What are the other components to the senior project?

3. What has the most important part of the senior project based on what you are seeing in the 2-hour presentations?

The most important part of the senior project based on what I saw was the senior's mentorship. Throughout the presentation they are talking about what they learned during their mentorship and their experience during that time. Their mentorship was based on their topic that they were presenting. 

4. What topic are you considering doing and why?

The topic that I am considering for my senior presentation is Marine Biology because ever since freshman year I have enjoyed learning about Marine Biology and I want to learn more about it through my mentorship. 

5. What are you doing for your summer mentorship? 

What I plan on doing for my summer mentorship is volunteering at an aquarium. I will either volunteer at San Pedro Cabrillo Marine Aquarium or at the Aquarium of the Pacific in Long Beach.