Greetings from Colorful Colorado!

Hello all,
My name is Kaity Denney and I am a rising third year at Michigan State College of Veterinary Medicine. My interests within vet med are varied, from small animal general practice to equine sports medicine and everything in between. This summer I am lucky enough to be at Littleton Equine Medical Center, located in Littleton, Colorado. I thought with my first post I would share a bit about the clinic, the area, and my accommodations. In the coming weeks I plan on sharing interesting cases that I get to see.
Littleton Equine Medical Center was founded in 1950 and served all large animals. As the community started to change, there were less farm animals and eventually Littleton started to serve equine clients only. Since then, the practice has grown to about 20 vets and techs, 4 intern doctors, and countless support staff. It is a huge clinic with an amazing case load. The doctors here see many varied cases including, sports med, repro, internal med, surgery, acupuncture/chiropractic, emergencies, and routine wellness care. There is a large emphasis on student education here, which I love. The clinic has the ability to do routine surgeries, emergency surgeries, full x-rays and ultra sounds, MRI's, and bone scans.
Littleton is a beautiful city located about 40 min outside of Denver. There a quite a few fun running trails here, along with world class hiking in Rocky Mountain National Park only a few hours away. Within Littleton there are a plethora of yummy places to eat and cute little stores to window shop at. The clinic itself is a massive old mansion type house that has been retrofitted to serve as a hospital. My room is located upstairs, with 2 other student rooms. Each room has 2 students in it and each room as its own bathroom. This summer there are a 2 other ICU intern students here, along with roughly 4 extern students that will stay for 2 weeks each. My room is half windows and looks out on the mountains! It is a breathtaking view to wake up to. There is a little kitchenette upstairs with a fridge to keep food in and then a shared full kitchen downstairs. I have taken to making a big meal on Sundays that I can then eat the rest of the week. This week I was able to get a beautiful hike in with some of the other students at Rocky Mountain National Park. South Platte River park is really close to the clinic and I have been running there daily. I also found an adorable used book store not too far from the park and have been reading again lately.
My job here at Littleton is to be an ICU intern student. I usually work 5-6 days a week. I have some night shifts (5pm-1am) and some day shifts (9am-5pm). For my first 2 weeks I will be in the ICU only, learning the ropes. After that, I get to venture out and do ambulatory calls one day a week and help with surgery one day a week. My responsibilities in the ICU include helping with treatments for the critical patients, cleaning/prepping stalls, stocking, and running diagnostics. For most critical patients we do a physical exam every 3 hours and administer meds, handwalk, feed and water them. Depending on the patients status we adjust that thought. Some patients get round the clock care and hands on monitoring, I love the med's part because it is so cool to be able to quiz myself on each drug we are giving, why we are giving it, its route of administration, and adverse side effects. I also get to help run bloodwork, including CBC, chem, and PCV/TP. A CBC is short for a complete blood count. This test looks at all of the different blood cells present in the patient and can give you a really good idea about the patients hydration status and what their white blood cell status is. A chem panel looks at what different electrolytes and enzyme levels are in the patient to give you a bigger picture of their current health status. I was able to take clinical pathology this last semester at MSU CVM and I love reading the bloodworks after I run them because I actually understand them after clin path. It is wonderful to be at a point in my education where I can start to solve puzzles of what is happening with patients.
So far I am really loving my time here. I love that the docs and techs are so engaging and really want us students to learn and be a part of cases. I will be back next week with cool cases to share :) Thanks so much for reading! Stay tuned!
Best,
Kaity