Offsite Electives

Students will spend time rotating between the hospital and ambulatory services, with one of 8 senior doctors, along side our 3-4 interns. Senior doctors include 3 boarded surgeons, 1 boarded internist, 4 ambulatory practitioners (one of whom specializes in dentistry, two who are heavily trained in reproduction, two certified in acupuncture, and one certified in chiropractic). Hospital caseload consists largely of colics, elective soft tissue surgery, and elective orthopedic cases as well as several (3-6/day on average) outpatient lamenesses/ultrasounds. Ambulatory work includes wellness, dentistry, lameness and prepurchase examinations, and smaller numbers of medicine-based cases (respiratory, endocrine, neurologic).

We are a mixed animal practice operating out of 4 clinic locations.  Our practice includes mixed animal, large animal exclusive, and small animal exclusive veterinarians.  Externs who visit our practice can spend their time with any species or combination of species.  We provide routine and emergency medicine and surgery services for large animals 24 hours a day via our ambulatory service.  Our small animal clinics provide daytime routine and emergency services including ultrasound, digital radiography, in-house bloodwork, and multiple surgery suites.  

Participation in outpatient and inpatient medical and surgical cases, triage and history taking and assessment of cases.  We are a full service AAHA accredited hospital and we cover our own after hour emergencies.

BluePearl is the Pacific Northwest’s premier veterinary specialty, 24-hour emergency and critical care center. With its emergency doctors, board-certified specialists, animal blood bank and state-of-the-art diagnostic and surgical suites, BluePearl provides access to innovative resources and comprehensive care when it is needed most.

What are the goals for my time at BluePearl?

We aim to provide education in the following areas in the ER/ICU rotation:

1. Triage skills
2. Physiology, recognition and treatment of shock, basic acid/base understanding
3. Good understanding of fluid therapy – especially use of synthetic and natural colloids
4. Basic approach to common emergencies
   1. Urethral obstruction      
   2. Gastric dilation/volvulus
   3. Cardiac emergencies
   4. Upper Respiratory Emergencies (Laryngeal paralysis, collapsing trachea, brachycephalic syndrome)
   5. Diabetic ketoacidosis
5. Some real world experience!

Please let us know if there are specific things you would like to learn or be exposed to during your stay – we will do our best to help.

Our clinic regularly hosts veterinary students. We offer Internal Medicine, Dentistry and emergency opportunities. This is an excellent oppoprtunity for a hands-on experience in a fast paced multi-disciplinary clinic.

The Georgia Aquarium provides veterinary students the unique opportunity to gain experience in the field of aquatic animal medicine at one of the largest aquariums in the world. We have an exceptionally large collection and heavy caseload providing numerous learning opportunities regarding cetacean, pinniped, elasmobranch, teleost, avian, reptile, amphibian and invertebrate medicine.

Preceptorships/externships lasting a minimum of 4 weeks and a maximum of 6 weeks are available. Preference will be given to 3rd and 4th year students, but all students may apply.

Mobile large animal practice

 40+ hours per week with the opportunity to assist/observe after hours emergencies and surgeries in the hospital and in the field.

Gain hands on experience with a wide variety of diagnostic and treatment disciplines. As an extern you will be exposed to a large variety of cases including reproduction, healthy and sick neonatal evaluations, medicine, surgery, chiropractic, acupuncture and lameness exams. Our aim is to provide students with a realistic example of a successful ambulatory and surgical practice.

We are a large mixed animal practice (Predominantly bovine, canine, and feline. Limited swine and small ruminant).

We have 8 veterinarians (4 are mixed animal, 2 are predominantly small animal, 1 is predominantly cattle, and 1 is swine and small animal). We also have 7 full time technicians. Our main location is in Maria Stein, OH but we also have small animal satelite clinics in Wapakoneta, Minster, and Versailles. 

There is plenty of opportunity for pregnancy checking cattle. DA (roll and tack as well as surgery) and sick cow work as available. The student can participate in large dairy team meetings and milk quality (milking system analysis, looking at milking procedures, etc.) work if that is going on while they are here for their externship.

There is also plenty of opportunity to observe/help with small animal routine and sick appointments, as well as small animal surgery. We do many routine surgeries (spay, neuter, dental, lump removals) but also offer other surgical services (abdominal exploratory, cystotomy, enterotomy/resection and anastamosis, etc.)

General practice with a broad range iof cases ranging from kitten wellness exams to geraictric full workups with the possiblity of referral to a secondary institution for surgery, dermatology. ophthamology, internal medicine, neurology, and other specialists in the area.  We draw from cases within the entire Portland Oregon/Vancouver, Washington metro area, because this practice has existed since 1977 and has a far-reaching reputation.