Describing a Place

Topography sort of means "describing a place," from its Latin roots, and in medicine it means looking at and feeling the surface of the patient and knowing what's up underneath. It's the reason I haven't posted hardly any stories lately (I had Mr Vet saved up to post when things got dire), because it took the form of an oral exam this past week.

The exam consisted of an examiner, a scribe, a dog, and me. The dog's name was Merlin and he looked kind of like this (picture from google):

The first thing I did was pet the dog. The first thing I was actually supposed to do was pick out four cards from different piles, and each one had two questions on it. The way it worked was he would name a structure, and I would palpate it and describe anything I could think of--nearby structures and landmarks, function, clinical significance. The entirety of anatomy examinable, both this year and last, and more than two weeks of study. It took about 10 minutes.

Unfortunately I wasn't just nervous, I was embarrassed about being so nervous. I petted the dog a lot, it didn't help.

The upshot is that now you can pretty much point anywhere on a dog, and I can tell you all kinds of shit about whatever it is you pointed at. 

PS: It is way easier to find the femoral pulse on an alive dog than on a dead one. I was unduly surprised when I felt it.