Externship Experience

Submitted by SAVMA Externship Grant Recipient Helena Taylor, Virginia-Maryland College of Veterinary Medicine

My externship and practicum experience in California with the USDA-APHIS-VS provided a hands-on experience as a field employee and emergency responder to HPAI. As a case manager, I assisted poultry producers with the process of eliminating HPAI from their farms, which allowed the "control zone" to be lifted and ultimately re-established international trade to that region of California. I learned the components of disease outbreak mitigation and management, the emergency response incident command structure, and how these dynamics are implemented to resolve a foreign animals disease outbreak. This experience emphasized the importance of veterinarians in disease control on national level and informed my future career as an emergency response veterinarian. I’m very grateful to have received the SAVMA Externship Grant to help fund this experience.