Memories

Ioana's loss brought back memories. And they were not great memories.

Memories from University. The famous Uni from Bucharest, where our horse vet chief surgeon, still preached about the benefits of firing horse tendons, when the rest of Europe had already banished it by law and classified it as animal cruelty.

The time when we were sneaking in as students trying to give a very dehydrated horse, lodged in the large animal hospital, more then the prescribed 1 L of IV fluids. One whole litre!!!

I could dig back dozens of such memories. I could also dig back the endless amount of unnecessary information, from the 60's if not sooner, that we had to memorize as students.

I could remember the times when I watched in amazement how, in the small animal clinic surgery, the reputed ortho surgeon repairs a fracture without gloves. "I can't feel the structures just the same with gloves" was the running excuse. Hello??? This is not like wearing a condom, optional! Performing surgical acts with sterile gloves on is mandatory nowadays!

Or speaking on his mobile during surgery, closes the phone and then goes back into surgery. For the next surgery, the same instruments were sprayed with alchool a few times, and reused again without blinking. And all these in the main teaching institution, that should set a good example to everybody else.

I used to feel guilty for not spending time in the university's clinics and see "practice". Another "rebel" vet colleague, who is probably abroad as well now, told me once "I don't want to hang around, just in case I get some bad habits". Too right!

Still, while a student, I never really comprehend the full extend of the lack of professionalism and diagnostic errors that occur in veterinary practice in Romania. I had a vague idea, thinking that even for the most reputed clinician, lacking lab tests, X-rays, cages to keep animals hospitalized, etc., life would be pretty impossible.

And then I finally graduated, and found an opportunity to work abroad in a vet practice abroad. It was in Cyprus, the influence was very British in the practice...and that's when everything started for me personally; it wasn't anything by any stretch of imagination extraordinary, just a regular small animal practice at European standards. I learned in the first year there more about small animal practice then in the whole years spent in the university. It wasn't easy, but before every new surgery I would see the next day, I got books at home and red in advance. And by books, I mean updated, large, reputed small animal textbooks,....not the leaflet i received in university as my small animal surgery book.

After a year and a half spent abroad, I decided to return and practice in Romania. That's when it hit me, the huge gap between what could be and what really is happening.

I watched my colleagues doing surgeries on half awake animals (full deep anesthesia is very dangerous). I watched everybody taking surgical instruments off the shelf, rinsing them in alcohol, if that much, and getting to surgery. I watched very simple and basic ideas of surgery being slayed, just as plain skin closure techniques, that in view of most Romanian vets, need to be done with the thickest suture available and as tight as possible "to hold well".

I also saw the other side, of being employed in a small animal practice and getting a salary of 400$ monthly...and sometimes not getting that at all.

I saw, in 2007!, 2 great value products being used on animals...tarantula venom that is meant to help in localising the abscesses, and moth ball powder sticked onto fresh wounds to keep parasites away. I saw many medieval concepts. I also saw it's a battle to change the old ways, and certainly, should I ever feel like changing the ways and opening a practice in Romania, it would have to be either on my own, or together with some other open minded other vets with some years of experience of practising abroad.

Because a sad reality is...Ioana speaks about referring the cases. Well, my sad Romanian conclusion is ...apart from 2 places I could think of where I would refer my animal in Romania, (and both of them away from Bucharest), all else is silence. One is a vet that moved out from Israel, and has a practice in Arad. The other one is our very own Ricky, that despite just having started the practice 6 months ago, is growing it into a nicely equipped practice, and compensates with his solid theory knowledge all else. They both lack something essential thou...a serious Romanian lab for accurate hormone dosing, biopsies, cultures. I mean, seriously. Where would you sent a thyroid panel in Romania?? And mostly, how many Romanian vets would see the necessity of the exam?

Anyway, sad but true, the romanian reality in vet medicine is very sad. I think there are some very big hearted people out there. But the lack of proper training, the "books are written from books" concept and the complete lack of basic equipment leads to some serious errors.... and I hardly see things changing anytime soon.

Middle Study Crisis

As I guess most of the guys in “the gang”, I’ve always wanted to be a vet, but I always had some problems with being underrated for being one. I guess this is one of the reasons for ending up in Vienna. If you live in the middle sized, Middle Eastern, middle everything country that Romania is, and you are born with the feeling that you have to save cuddly little innocent animals, you are being faced with the paradox that, in spite your good intentions, you end up being considered a second hand doctor, barely more than an animal science technician. And even more sadly…you end up realizing that it’s exactly what you became.

I always had an issue with human doctors. It’s not their fault, I guess it’s mine (or ours), but always hated the inconsideration and the condescendence with which they look upon our profession. Why? ... Actually they’re right, and that’s what makes me angry. Why do we have to be less than them?! Is it maybe because we eat our patients? Is it maybe because our patients’ lives literally have financial meaning? Because we are taught to think economically?

And the whole system we’re running around in, beginning from the faculty that “built” us and ending with the private practice or the farm we work in…it all gives me a feeling of uselessness.

I had this talk with myself a long time ago, and asked myself what do I really want to do? Do I want to do real medicine, or do I want to help animals on a larger scale? Because sometimes these things are quite different. Five years ago, when I got into vet school I said to myself that I will do both, by doing wildlife medicine. I won’t have to deal with crazy owners, fat over spoiled poodles (I own 2, and I know how the little devils think…), I won’t have to be confined to a small private practice. So small animal medicine was not for me.

…Until I got to see what small animal medicine means in Vienna…Until I saw what you can do when you have an ultrasound in every room, Rx, CT, MRI just around the corner, every imaginable lab works ready until tomorrow, every student walks around with Littman around their necks, surgery equipment they don’t afford in Romania in human hospitals (I started seeing laparoscopy as the norm…I have seen so many surgeries, courses and rentability studies on laparoscopy, that I wonder why didn’t they start using this technique earlier?!) My everlasting dream of roaming the forests in search of God knows what GPS-tracked critter started to transform into a simple biologist’s job. I have suddenly seen an opportunity to step up there, next to the human doctors…

Actually life in Vienna is not a revelation and it’s not so pink at all as it may seem. But that’s another story…

…to be continued….

Ioana

Life is a beach

I found myself this afternoon on the beach.

It was a perfect sunny day, the temperatures was in the upper end 20's, patchy clouds now and then, and I was spending my afternoon on one of the finest Caribbean beaches. The picture was complete with perfect golden icing sugar sand, palm trees and the clearest turquoise water I have ever seen before that. The 7 Mile beach.

It was a long awaited break from the hectic rhythm at work, and around me was a fair number of people, in small gangs, spending their afternoon on the beach as well.

I had 2 editions of National Geographic to keep me company. There was one article in particular that caught my eye. It was about the Kurds, and the ethnic troubles that bother the intersection of Irak, Syria and Turkey. I was particular attention as I have a once very close Romanian friend that works very close to the region.

Looking around me, and then looking at the photos, reading and knowing about the trouble, bomb attacks and danger happening in the same time in another corner of the planet I couldn't help but feeling in a parallel universe. I drifted later on somewhat remembering there is such a huge difference between my own home place, a safe but tough country, and the place where I am now, with all the prosperity and easy lifestyle surrounding me.

And then I looked at the people around me, wondering if they ever appreciate where they are, if they actually know how easy their life is, or are they just taking it for granted? I have seen too many spoiled...nearly pointed the finger at the nation, :) politically incorrect, well I'll just say spoiled north Americans to know they probably don't...

And then there were a few chicks a few meters away, bitching away about ..various general stuff.. and I knew for sure most people here don't appreciate the good and affordable heath care system they have for instance, or the cheap petrol, or the perpetual perfect summer,

and as it happened actually more then once, I wished I could pack them all up and send them for a 6 months of compulsory living in Urlati, Romania. Or Mizil, Romania for that matter.

I reckon upon return the world would be a better place. For both parties involved:)