Lung pattern identification is challenging but a critical skill. This presentation will review radiographic identification of lung patterns, with many practice cases.

This presentation will review the normal appearance of the stomach and intestines, and then discuss the radiographic changes of intestinal ileus, and differentiating obstructive from non-obstructive disease. Some GI ultrasound will be included to show how it can aid in the diagnosis of obstruction.

This presentation will cover the use of thoracic ultrasound (non-cardiac) in aiding diagnosis of challenging thoracic disease.  Numerous case examples will be discussed.

This will be a fun wrap-up talk, with fun or unusual cases I’ve seen over the past 35 years. This will also be a “What’s Your Diagnosis” type lecture.

As a certified cat behavior consultant and veterinary technician, I am lucky to bring a clinical eye to the home environment. Many behavior concerns have medical roots that would otherwise go unnoticed. Cats are unique in that they are both predator and prey animals. Due to this, assessing their pain is challenging not only for pet owners, but also for veterinary professionals. As veterinary technicians, it is crucial that we are able to identify pain in cats and communicate its significance to our clients.

Many cats feel fear, anxiety, and stress when being handled and/or approached. The effects of feeling this way can lead to reduced quality of life for the patient and animal care teams, an increase in injury to staff, and make owners less likely to bring their cats in for veterinary visits. Fear, anxiety and stress can also make veterinary visits more difficult and lead to lower quality care, fewer diagnostics, and ultimately poorer medical outcomes. Lastly, it can lead to cats being surrendered due to broken bonds between pets and their owners. This is why it is vital for us to do what we can to limit fear, anxiety, and stress in the cats we are working with and provide consistent, positive human to cat social interactions.

In this session, we will discuss the effects and how to identify the signs of fear, anxiety, and stress in our cats. We will also discuss tools and handling techniques that can help reduce fear, anxiety, and stress in cats thus making the shelter, veterinarian and home an overall less stressful and happier place for cats, visitors, employees, and volunteers. When a cat’s fear and anxiety is reduced, animals will be more adoptable and more likely to stay in long-term, loving homes.

Veterinary team members often express doubt about handling dogs. The best way to know a dog’s emotional state and whether they are relaxed enough to cope with the stress of veterinary procedures is to watch their body language. This session will help you understand how dogs communicate with us and determine how to tell when they are fearful, stressed, anxious, or happy. This is the first step to Fear-Free handling.

As they say, “An ounce of prevention is worth a pound of cure.” This is absolutely true with canine and feline behavioral concerns related to fear, anxiety, and stress. With behavior issues being the number one reason for pet relinquishment, it is imperative that veterinary hospitals offer behavioral assistance and guidance for their clients/patients. Behavior issues can be complex problems to solve, but there are ways to prevent, manage, and help our clients with these issues. Attendees will learn how to start the conversation, respond efficiently, and successively to clients concerns about behavior. Behavior problems are a major concern to clients. With interest in helping client’s resolve these problems, we become better veterinary professionals and better advocates for our patients.

There are a variety of common equine myopathies and neuromuscular disorders including polysaccharide storage myopathy (types 1 and 2), exertional rhabdomyolysis, myofibrillar myopathy, vitamin E responsive myopathy and equine motor neuron disease among others. This presentation will describe the clinical presentation, pathophysiology, diagnostics, treatment and prognosis of these conditions.

Working up a horse with a history of collapse can be intimidating, and there are a wide variety of potential etiologies. This discussion will encompass a variety of causes associated with acute equine collapse, pathophysiology, diagnostics, treatment and prognosis.

This presentation will talk about common clinical uses for chiropractic and acupuncture therapy as well as supporting scientific studies.

This presentation will describe how an exercise test is performed in the field setting. It will discuss ways to evaluate the cardiovascular and respiratory system for pathology in addition to assessing fitness in otherwise healthy horses.