Technology

The RVC Alumni Fund enables the provision of an enriched student experience. It helps to resource cutting-edge equipment and technology which provides students with the opportunity to hone their clinical skills before working with live animals and heading into the veterinary profession.

Advanced Teaching Models in the RVC's Clinical Skills Centre

Thanks to your support, the RVC Alumni Fund has been able to fund farm teaching models including the Bovine Calving Simulator (known as Pint and Half Pint) and Castro the piglet.  These have been invaluable for pre-clinical husbandry teaching as well as for clinical teaching. The demand for using them has even resulted in them requiring their own diary!

Meet the new addition to the family, Weany the piglet...

Thanks to the RVC Alumni Fund, the latest addition to this wonderful family has arrived! Weany is an advanced piglet model, which enables students to practise taking blood from a pig, something that is notoriously difficult to do and takes practice. The simulator enables students to practise blood sampling, euthanasia and castration, all of which can be daunting as a new student. Being able to practise on a realistic (and much quieter!) model before being faced with the real thing is paramount to student confidence and, most importantly, animal welfare. 

Simulators will never replace live animal experience but they do mean that students are much more prepared for the real thing down on the farms. Students can practise as much as they need to in the RVC Clinical Skills Centre. It’s important to supplement live animal work with appropriate and realistic simulators where possible.

The simulator plays an important role across other areas of the RVC including:

• Educational research projects
• Widening Participation activities (such as a pre-vet summer school aimed at A-level students)
• Demonstrations as a part of Open Farm Sunday (enhancing community engagement)
• Continuing Professional Development, e.g. farmers, smallholders (injection practice) and veterinary interns (blood sampling).

Thank you for making a difference to students and animal welfare