gms | German Medical Science

The curriculum for veterinary students in Germany demands learning in the field of population medicine. Students need to understand the concept of working with large farm animal populations, and have to experience extension service under field related conditions. At the University of Veterinary Medicine Hannover students participate in the ambulatory service and mobile clinics during their studies addressing different animal species. While theoretical background knowledge is provided in the different animal clinics at the University, students also attend an obligatory internship at the University farm to learn about different farm animal species. Students have the opportunity for hands on experiences in their clinical education on an obligatory base on poultry and cattle farms during ambulatory service. As electives they can choose to participate in the extension service for poultry, fish, cattle, pigs, sheep and goats. Only by own field experiences they reach the higher levels of the cognitive learning steps such as knowledge analysis and synthesis. With this exposure to the farm animals in the field they will understand the problems of factorial disease, high variation in clinical pictures, and the influence of economics in the diagnostic and decision process of a veterinarian working with large farm animal populations.