Friday, March 1, 2019
Lucy Grieve, course organiser for Radiography & Ultrasound Fundamentals, talks to us about why this course is important...
Why are radiography and ultrasound skills important?
Most vets are required to examine horses for musculoskeletal issues, whether you are regularly undertaking lameness investigations or seeing a wound out of hours. Being able to achieve good quality images is essential, as you can rarely delegate to someone else in such situations (and nor should you want to!).
Once you have mastered this skill you can then undertake interpretation safe in the knowledge you have the best images possible in front of you for the case you are dealing with. Those images can then be sent for second opinions, used for insurance or pre-purchase purposes without the fear that they will be deemed inadequate or non-diagnostic, and knowing you have done the best for your client (and hopefully not needing to go back to take more!). Being competent at the routine diagnostic imaging procedures also means you will be better prepared for thinking outside the box when you come across unusual cases, safe in the knowledge you are adding value and information to your investigations. Reading images is challenging at the best of times, so being slick, confident and successful at getting good images is half the battle won.
Can vets not just perfect those skills in their day-to-day work?
We all know that the more you do the better you get, but it’s also important to be learning correctly from the outset. It’s easy to pick up bad habits or to have completely missed the memo on a trick that helps with certain views. Techniques are constantly progressing so it is easy to be out of date with new projections and handy tips. Similarly if you rarely have someone else critique your images it is easy to assume you are doing well and be blissfully unaware of the scope for improvement and your untapped potential. After all, you don’t know what you don’t know!
What’s the difference between a good and bad radiograph?
A good radiograph is diagnostic (appropriate labelling, exposure, collimation and position), and one that didn’t take multiple attempts to achieve it! It’s not easy to get everything right first time but we shouldn’t be disheartened by the difficulty in achieving good quality images – anyone can do it with the correct teaching and it’s enormously satisfying when it happens. Some simple tips can be surprisingly helpful and this applies to ultrasound also.
What will be covered by the course?
The pre-course online learning and quiz will ensure the delegates are up to speed for the day and helps the speakers identify what aspects to emphasise on the day. We’ll spend the morning exploring the essential theory behind the practical skills, then we test that theory with some case examples in a panel discussion format. After a hearty lunch we move to hands-on practical teaching, more case-based learning and a final panel discussion covering the more complex, multi-modal cases. There’s a lot packed into this course, so coffee is free-flowing of course!
Learn the Fundamentals of Radiography and Ultrasound
On the 21 June join Lucy and other leading experts to discuss the radiography and ultrasound skills deemed essential for any vet seeing horses in general practice.
Find out more and book
This post was last updated on
Currently rated 5.0 by 1 people