BSAVA Companion - 2025, Student Companion, February

A PDF of the full Student issue of Companion.

Student Companion posed this question to a group of vets and this is what they had to say…

Welcome from Fergus Allerton – your Companion editor!

The BSAVA has a community of over 10,000 members in every stage of their veterinary career, from students like you, to practice managers, all collectively working together to improve the welfare of small animals.

As a BSAVA member, you will be helping us create and deliver the cutting-edge courses, publications and resources that have been driving improvements in the profession for over 60 years. So, join today and begin excelling in your career with our fantastic member benefits at your disposal!

BSAVA Congress and EXPO is just around the corner! Taking place at Manchester Central in March, Congress and EXPO is the perfect place to get your years’ CPD. Engage with the leading industry exhibitors within the exhibition hall, network with fellow veterinary professions and let your hair down at our renowned party night, CLUBvet. There truly is something for everyone to get involved in at BSAVA Congress and Expo 2025!

    Are you an undergraduate vet, vet nurse, or bioveterinary science student interested in clinical studies? Here’s your chance to dive into the world of research with our funding for a 6–10-week companion animal science project! We offer a £200/week stipend, up to £1200 for consumables, and the chance to showcase your work at BSAVA Congress and EXPO – perfect for boosting your presentation skills.

Sze Lynn Yuen graduated from the Cambridge Vet School in the summer of 2024. She has been an active volunteer for the BSAVA from her student days and has been the recipient of PetSavers funding for her BOAS research. Here Sze Lynn highlights her BSAVA volunteering activities and her first steps into clinical practice.

The BSAVA gives you the tools you need to thrive post-graduation and in practice.

  Read any article about burnout that’s been written in the last 5 years, particularly if it’s about the veterinary profession, and you might end up with the impression that burnout is an inevitability. Sarah Keir takes this opportunity to tell you this is not the case, and it’s entirely within your control to prevent burnout.

 Sophie Oliver graduated in 2023 from Nottingham Vet School and is the BSAVA’s Student Liaison Officer. Sophie spoke to Student Companion about her BSAVA volunteering experiences and her first steps into practice after graduation.

  When intensive care consultant Matt Morgan is wrestling with a clinical conundrum, he is quite likely to go looking for answers at the zoo rather than a medical library. In his job at the University Hospital of Wales in Cardiff, he has discovered that many challenges in human emergency medicine were solved millions of years ago by members of the animal kingdom. His book One medicine – how understanding animals can save your life shows how much NHS staff can learn from studying comparative physiology, anatomy and behaviour. John Bonner reports…

(First published in BSAVA Companion August 2023)

Article abstracts from the Journal of Small Animal Practice.