This programme is exclusively available to XLVet Members.
Duration: 8 days, 3 modules.
Delegates: New Graduates and those who have changed species specialism recently.
Overview: Survival Skills, Dairy Days, Beef and Sheep Skills and Practical Pathology.
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Programme Outline:
Survival Skills
- Driver skills.
- Mastering medicines.
- Managing your wellbeing.
- Pigs & Poultry.
Survival Skills includes a half-day session on driving skills; how to keep safe when driving under pressure and in poor conditions, and practical defensive driving skills with a skid pan experience.
How to achieve better clinical outcomes; improving confidence, reducing stress and minimising the risk of accidents on-farm. Wellbeing in practice is also covered, by looking at ways to understand your own personality, building successful relationships at work and managing difficult situations in practice.
Finally ‘Pigs and Poultry’, looking at the common disease problems in both species and how to manage them via a mix of practical and theory.
Dairy Days
- Calving the cow.
- Down cows.
- Surgery – an approach to common situations.
- Transition management – what is it?
- Lameness identification.
- First aid treatment.
Focusing on calving, milk fever, dealing with down cows and casualty cows, delegates will then consider data on-farm and what insights can be delivered from milk recording. Day two offers a practical surgery experience, graduates will go to a local fallen stock unit, allowing them to perform surgery on dead animals, going on to look at specific techniques that you may wish to discuss, e.g. LDA, anaesthesia, enucleation.
The afternoon will be spent looking at postpartum illnesses such as endometritis, metritis and mastitis, day three is all about lameness, giving delegates the chance to practice trimming on cadaver feet, following a farm walk to discuss treatment and prevention of lameness.
Beef & Sheep skills and Practical Pathology
- Diagnosis, treatment and prevention of common diseases in cattle & sheep.
- Infertility.
- Managing difficult c-sections.
- Practical pathology.
Explore health planning for sheep and beef farms including production data, vaccination protocols and parasite plans. During the beef section of this module, graduates will look at investigating infertility in the beef herd – condition scoring, nutrition, pelvimetry and heifer management. Later discussing the use of trace elements, how to approach pneumonia outbreaks, the ins and outs of CHeCs health scheme testing with regard to BVD and Johnes. Sheep Skills looks at how to approach investigations of pruritic sheep, abortion, high barren rate, ill thrift, lameness, SCOPS principles, basic sheep nutrition and condition scoring.
Content: Clinical and non clinical.
Included: Four nights accommodation, evening meals and lunches, as required for the course.
Trainers: Our trainers consist of a team of experts from across the community, supported by external expertise from across the industry, who share their knowledge and experience to create a programme that is at the forefront of Farm continued professional development.
Testimonials:
‘Completely worthwhile, it’s a laid back and practical approach to learning and a good opportunity to mix with people in the same situation as yourself.’
David McCann at Millcroft Vets, Farm Graduate Development Programme
‘Fantastic course, great to meet other grads who are ‘in the same boat’ and find themselves in the same situations. Driving skills was great and mastering medicines was very useful and a great refresher. It was good to learn about listening skills and dealing with difficult situations.’
Aine O’Driscoll at Dunmuir Vet Group, Farm Graduate Development Programme