{"id":17831,"date":"2025-02-13T11:31:25","date_gmt":"2025-02-13T11:31:25","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.vets-now.com\/careers\/?p=17831"},"modified":"2025-02-17T15:27:43","modified_gmt":"2025-02-17T15:27:43","slug":"students-guide-ecc","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.vets-now.com\/careers\/news\/2025\/02\/13\/students-guide-ecc\/","title":{"rendered":"A student\u2019s guide to surviving &#038; thriving in an ECC placement"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><strong><strong><em>By Rosie Meynell<\/em><\/strong><\/strong><\/p>\n<p>In January,<a href=\"https:\/\/www.vets-now.com\/careers\/undergraduates\/\"> I undertook a 2-week placement with Vets Now,<\/a> and it opened my eyes to the fast-paced and unpredictable world of the Emergency and Critical Care (ECC) side of Veterinary Medicine. Having only seen occasional emergencies during my other first-opinion placements, I wasn\u2019t entirely sure what to expect. All I knew was that there would be lots and lots of emergencies and to be prepared for anything!<\/p>\n<p>And you know what, this placement actually ended up being one of the most rewarding learning opportunities of my veterinary journey so far! Here\u2019s a roundup of my placement, the lessons I learned, and some tips for students preparing for their own ECC adventures.<\/p>\n<h2>Preparation is key<\/h2>\n<p>Before starting my placement, I reached out to my friends and classmates to get an idea of the cases I might encounter in this placement. Based on their insights, I created a \u201cbingo card\u201d of common ECC presentations. It included cases like blocked cats, foreign objects, poisonings, GDV (gastric dilatation-volvulus), road traffic accidents, renal failure, dog fight wounds, cat bite abscesses, dyspnoeic cats, and of course, labradors eating things they shouldn\u2019t!<\/p>\n<p>This fun exercise helped me identify knowledge gaps and gave me a roadmap for pre-placement reading. Understanding the basics of stabilisation, diagnostics, and treatment for these cases made me feel more confident walking through the door on day one.<\/p>\n<h2>The reality of ECC<\/h2>\n<p>From the moment I started, it was clear that ECC placements are a different beast. While emergencies occasionally crop up in first-opinion practice, here they\u2019re the norm. Every case that came through the door demanded swift action, whether it was a dog needing immediate emesis induction or a cat in respiratory distress.<\/p>\n<p>The intensity of the environment means that the vet team on shift are often juggling multiple critical patients simultaneously. Add in a roster of inpatients requiring regular monitoring and treatment, and it\u2019s easy to see why time management and teamwork are essential skills here!<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>By Rosie Meynell In January, I undertook a 2-week placement with Vets Now, and it opened &hellip;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":10,"featured_media":17856,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"content-type":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[6217],"tags":[],"acf":[],"yoast_head":"<!-- This site is optimized with the Yoast SEO Premium plugin v20.3 (Yoast SEO v22.3) - https:\/\/yoast.com\/wordpress\/plugins\/seo\/ -->\n<title>A student\u2019s guide to surviving &amp; thriving in an ECC placement - Vets Now Jobs<\/title>\n<meta name=\"description\" content=\"A placement with Vets Now is challenging,, and deeply rewarding. It provides an excellent insights into the realities of emergency veterinary medicine.\" \/>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/www.vets-now.com\/careers\/news\/2025\/02\/13\/students-guide-ecc\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_GB\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"A student\u2019s guide to surviving &amp; thriving in an ECC placement\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"A placement with Vets Now is challenging,, and deeply rewarding. It provides an excellent insights into the realities of emergency veterinary medicine.\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:url\" content=\"https:\/\/www.vets-now.com\/careers\/news\/2025\/02\/13\/students-guide-ecc\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:site_name\" content=\"Vets Now Jobs\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:publisher\" content=\"https:\/\/www.facebook.com\/VetsNow\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:published_time\" content=\"2025-02-13T11:31:25+00:00\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:modified_time\" content=\"2025-02-17T15:27:43+00:00\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:image\" content=\"https:\/\/static-az.vets-now.com\/uploads\/sites\/9\/2025\/02\/rosie-vets-now-placement.jpg\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:width\" content=\"480\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:height\" content=\"270\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:type\" content=\"image\/jpeg\" \/>\n<meta name=\"author\" content=\"Vets Now Team Member\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:card\" content=\"summary_large_image\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:creator\" content=\"@VetsNowUK\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:site\" content=\"@VetsNowUK\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:label1\" content=\"Written by\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data1\" content=\"Vets Now Team Member\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:label2\" content=\"Estimated reading time\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data2\" content=\"5 minutes\" \/>\n<script type=\"application\/ld+json\" class=\"yoast-schema-graph\">{\"@context\":\"https:\/\/schema.org\",\"@graph\":[{\"@type\":\"Article\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.vets-now.com\/careers\/news\/2025\/02\/13\/students-guide-ecc\/#article\",\"isPartOf\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.vets-now.com\/careers\/news\/2025\/02\/13\/students-guide-ecc\/\"},\"author\":{\"name\":\"Vets Now Team Member\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.vets-now.com\/careers\/#\/schema\/person\/6019f4da3dc79e9137c315cbdcb31e7d\"},\"headline\":\"A student\u2019s guide to surviving &#038; thriving in an ECC placement\",\"datePublished\":\"2025-02-13T11:31:25+00:00\",\"dateModified\":\"2025-02-17T15:27:43+00:00\",\"mainEntityOfPage\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.vets-now.com\/careers\/news\/2025\/02\/13\/students-guide-ecc\/\"},\"wordCount\":344,\"publisher\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.vets-now.com\/careers\/#organization\"},\"image\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.vets-now.com\/careers\/news\/2025\/02\/13\/students-guide-ecc\/#primaryimage\"},\"thumbnailUrl\":\"https:\/\/static-az.vets-now.com\/uploads\/sites\/9\/2025\/02\/rosie-vets-now-placement.jpg\",\"articleSection\":[\"Students\"],\"inLanguage\":\"en-GB\",\"description\":\"A placement with Vets Now is challenging,, and deeply rewarding. 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