IVSA UPenn Thailand Trip 2010

By: Steven Fernandez

Class of 2013, University of Pennsylvania

The International Veterinary Student Association (IVSA) University of Pennsylvania chapter took on the challenge this past year to organize a trip with a contact from a Thai veterinarian and practice owner of Vet4 Polyclinic in Bangkok, Thailand. Our IVSA UPenn chapter was unaware that this veterinary practice is a well-known and respected clinic in all of Thailand. Vet4 was the first clinic in Thailand to start hydrotherapy for dogs and third to do total hip replacements. Hundreds of emails later throughout the entire academic year, IVSA UPenn sent 14 veterinary students and one local veterinarian to Bangkok, Thailand to start their hands-on training 9,500 miles away.

The trip consisted of 5 clinic days where the students were able to do full spays and castrations from incision to closure at no cost to the owners. We held a series of wetlabs using cadavers weeks in advance to prepare for surgery thanks to the help of our IVSA faculty advisor and surgery residents. Throughout the year we fundraised as much as possible to reduce the cost of the trip and we received lots of donations to offer better medical care for our patients. We brought extra luggage filled with IDEXX Snap tests, injectable Metacam (courtesy of Boerhinger-Ingelheim) for pain management, sterile surgery gloves, lots of frontline (courtesy of Merial), and sterile drapes (courtesy of GEPCO). Students learned how to keep their patient under anesthesia using basic drugs that were available to us. One of the major challenges with outdoor surgery was the incredibly high temperatures dogs had while recovering. Nonetheless, animals did recover and were sent on their way once they were able to walk.

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International Veterinary Exchange Committee Scholarships

Are you planning a grand trip to another country to learn about veterinary medicine? Want a chance at some easy cash to help pay for the trip? Look no further than here, with your International Veterinary Exchange Committee!

The IVEC is offering three individual international travel student scholarships, $500 each AND one IVSA Club Awards, $500. The club award is available for International Veterinary Student Association (IVSA) chapters for events and activities related to international vet med.

Deadlines: Individual scholarship and IVSA Club Award applications are due February 1st, 2011

Applications will be posted on the SAVMA IVEC website soon: http://www.avma.org/noah/members/savma/committees/internat.asp

Questions about this opportunity can be sent to: ivecscholarships@gmail.com

Help Host an International Student Exchange!

On behalf of the SAVMA International Veterinary Exchange Committee, we would like to take this opportunity to invite you to participate in a national contest. Currently, the International Veterinary Exchange Committee is trying to update its database of potential U.S. Veterinarian Hosts – those veterinarians who would be interested in hosting an international veterinary student at their clinic.

We would like to involve all schools and IVSA Chapters in increasing the database for the Host Program

and are offering two monetary gifts for the individual student and overall IVSA Chapter (if there is no

current IVSA Chapter funds at the winning school, the SCAVMA Chapter will be awarded the funds) who

provide the most names of potential Host Veterinarians. The individual student who obtains the most

veterinarians for the database will receive a $125 scholarship and the overall IVSA chapter that provides

the most veterinarians to the database will receive a $125 scholarship.

As your fellow students prepare for internships, externships, and mentorships, it would be a perfect

time to encourage all members of IVSA chapters, along with the general student body, to invite

veterinarians to participate in the Host Program.

The process is easy! Contact your SAVMA delegate for more information and to get the forms to provide to interested veterinarians. Those interested veterinarians should fill out the forms completely and send

them back to the International Exchange Officer by email, fax or post.

All names are due to the International Exchange Officer and even though names will be continuously

added to the Host List, the contest will cease on July 1, 2011.

If you have any questions please feel free to contact the International Veterinary Exchange Committee

or the International Exchange Officer. You can find more information at http://www.avma.org/savma/ieo/get-involved.asp.

Where are you headed this summer?

Why not Denmark? Join veterinary students from around the world at the 59th Annual International Veterinary Student Association's Summer Congress in Copenhagen. BUT--Registration closes at the end of this month! So, get your application in by March 30th if you want to get in on this wonderful opportunity. More information and the application can be found at: http://www.ivsadenmark.dk/

Contact SAVMA's International Exchange Officer, Deirdre Murdy for more info at SAVMAIEO@gmail.com

Symposium Update, part 2

The second day of the SAVMA House of Delegates is flying by and it's hard to believe we're almost finished with our meeting! Today we held the elections for our new officer positions and the future site of SAVMA Symposium 2012. The winners are: Joe Esch for President-elect, Rayne Johnson for International Exchange Officer-elect and Claire McPhee for Global and Public Health Officer-elect. Congratulations to these guys. I know they are going to be good additions to the SAVMA Executive Committee.

The winner of the 2012 SAVMA Symposium bid was....

On the international front, please check out the opportunities available to SAVMA Students at the 59th Annual IVSA Congress. The International Veterinary Student Association will be hosting the Congress in Copenhagen, Denmark this year from July 8-18th, 2010. All SAVMA members are eligible to attend this congress and it's a great way to get to know students from all around the world. Registration is open until March 31, 2010, so hurry up and register! More information can be found at www.ivsadenmark.dk