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K-Statement
Keeping
animals healthy, food safe It may not be so easy these days to find a doctor for your sick cow or pig. * But without veterinary support, livestock operations won’t be as healthy, productive or safe, said Ralph Richardson, dean of the College of Veterinary Medicine at K-State. That's why the college has made efforts to educate more students as food-animal veterinarians.
"These scholarships, along with a mentoring and clinical skills course that incorporates teaching by practicing veterinarians, are the sorts of things that we hope will meet the needs of our state and the country," Richardson said. "If we create economic opportunities and show our students examples of successful veterinarians with fulfilling careers, we hope to turn the tide." Richardson said as more and more people have moved from rural America to metropolitan centers, the demand for companion animal veterinary care has increased. But with a fixed number of seats available in veterinary schools across the country, the number of students going into large-animal medicine, as well as food safety, meat inspection, public health and academic veterinary medicine, has decreased. So in addition to incentives to enter food-animal medicine, Richardson said he believes more seats are needed in the College of Veterinary Medicine in general. He said the college hopes to compete for federal funds to increase student and faculty numbers through a recently introduced act. In addition, K-State has created a new, six-week intensive advanced beef production medicine course with support from the Pfizer Animal Health Beef Production Medicine Fund. The new advanced course is an outgrowth of two courses the college launched in 2005: advanced cow-calf production medicine and advanced feedlot production medicine. Offered in the spring and fall, respectively, these three-week courses are limited to 15 to 20 students per year. The new course will be offered during May and June and will be open to 30 students from K-State and other cooperating veterinary colleges. Researchers in the K-State College of Business Administration have looked at the shortage of food-animal veterinarians and are now bringing their recommendations for turning the problem around to the Food Supply Veterinary Medicine Coalition. The coalition, with Bayer Animal Health, commissioned David Andrus, professor of marketing, Bruce Prince, professor of management, and Kevin Gwinner, associate professor and interim head of the department of marketing, to perform the study. Andrus said the research looked at the supply and demand of veterinarians, how to attract people to the profession and the job satisfaction and commitment of food-animal veterinarians to their profession. "Without veterinary support, livestock operations will not be as healthy or productive," Richardson said. "Without these veterinarians in the field to recognize emerging infectious diseases and, perhaps even foreign animal diseases such as Foot and Mouth Disease, our country's livestock security is at risk. Veterinarians are part of the food safety and security network of our country's food supply."
Photo: Dr. Meredyth Jones, left, food animal clinician, and Megan Behrens, right, fourth-year veterinary student, observe Kelly Strecker, fourth-year veterinary student, collecting blood from an Angus cow at the Veterinary Medical Teaching Hospital. Photo courtesy Brennan Engle March 22, 2006 / Vol. 29, No. 17
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K-State
and the state of Kansas now offer a debt forgiveness plan -- the
first of its kind in the country -- for veterinary students wanting
to work in rural Kansas supporting communities and the livestock
industry. Full tuition is forgiven for five first-year students
each year if the student agrees to work one year in rural Kansas
per year of schooling funded.