Alison. 22. RVC 3rd Year, ex G+T.

It appears winter is on it's way. I love this time of year, the evenings getting dark... bonfires. It reminds me of home.

I'm feeling a bit unmotivated this week, I can't keep up with writing my lectures up and my study report isn't progressing as I'd wish haha as in I'd wish it to write itself! Turned up for a tutorial meeting about it and the guy didn't turn up. Apparently he was in the room next door, bizarre as I saw no one and he didn't leave a note. So now got to try and find time to meet up with another member of staff. Sigh.

Done some quite practical things this week surprisingly, a break from the monotony of DLs and lectures.

We had a feeding tube practical where we had to successfully place an oesophageal 14FR feeding tube and carry out a surgical flip. This basically involved sticking pair of carmalt forceps (they can lock shut) down the throat, cutting a hole through the side of the oesophageus, clamp the end of the tube in the carmalts and pull them slowly out of the throat. So then you end up with end you want in the stomach, sticking out of the mouth and the feeding end sticking out of the neck. You then turn the stomach end back on itself and push gently down the throat while pulling on the the neck end. It should result in a flip within the throat and the correct end facing the stomach. Pretty easy to do on a model but probably not on an animal.

I also had my haptic cow practical which is pretty cool. It's a simulated rectal examination of a cow. And apparently it feels just like the real thing. Though it's a bit bizarre just sticking one finger into a thimble and not feeling with your whole hand. I'm sure I'll improve in the future at it as I was a bit rubbish yesterday.

Here's a video on Haptics at the RVC:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ephvAcFeGnU
Explains it better than I can!

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