The Dangers of Vet School

Vet school is a dangerous place, it really is. From day one we get taught the safe way to do things and it should all probably be incorporated into a separate module called ‘How not to get killed by your patients’.

It could be the obvious like getting bitten by a grumpy, or a swift kick from a ill mannered pony… Or you could be me and catch an innocuous disease and end up hospitalised.

Orf tends to be the disease that you catch lambing, everyone has a good time laughing about it when you get back to uni and then it disappears.

I had no symptoms until 2 weeks after lambing then a little lesion started to appear, I wasn’t worried but went to my GP anyway. She had no idea what Orf even was, googled it in front of me and told me to leave it alone, so I did.

Fast forward another two weeks, it was the second day of the summer term, exams were looming and I woke up with a finger that resembled a sausage. Off I went to the GP, this time she took one look at me, said I may lose my finger and referred me to University College London Hospital under the care of Tropical and Infectious Diseases. I spent 6 days in hospital, developed Erythema Multiforme but my finger was intact and went home with 18 different drugs for 6 weeks.

So my unique experience of this delightful disease brings me to writing this, since it’s coming up to lambing time and I’m sure quite a lot of vet students will be lucky enough to catch Orf this Easter.

There seems to be little awareness of it unless you’re a vet or a farmer, probably one of the reasons I was in hospital for so long and paraded in front of many professors and medical students, yet it is so common. During my time in hospital I wasn’t actually diagnosed with Orf and Erythema Multiforme until day 5, I had varying diagnoses ranging from an allergic reaction to syphilis.

Most people will be textbook Orf sufferers and never even see a doctor, and I’m sure I was unlucky to react so severely and be left with a scar plus reoccurring Erythema Multiforme. But I now definitely have a very real understanding of how it feels to be a sheep with Orf!

Though this picture did cheer me up when I was in hospital, created by one of my classmates…

Alison is 22 years old, from North Yorkshire. Studying at the Royal Veterinary College, London.
Currently in third year, after completing the Graduate and Transfer year. She holds a BSc (Hons) in Animal Science from the University of Leeds.
Equine biased, but she has a fondness for small furry creatures too.