Submission by Catherine Lang, Texas A&M.  Congrats on your 1st Place Experiences Award!

         Fourth-year. Clinics. The year we all daydreamed of while zoning out in first-year anatomy lab. The year we finally face live patients, as opposed to cadavers. The year we finally get to apply our book knowledge in a clinical setting. Instead of spending all day in the library pouring over books and powerpoints, we spend all day in the hospital – ordering lab work, running to the pharmacy to pick up medication, and learning how to think like a doctor.

         I’m tracking small animal because I’m interested in going into a small animal private practice when I graduate. As a result, I’ve spent the majority of my year in the Small Animal Hospital at Texas A&M. Built into the small animal track are four weeks of externship that I can use to learn about how veterinary medicine is practiced outside of the University walls. Most people use this time as an opportunity to work in a private practice in the U.S. – perhaps as a way to learn more about a clinic that they’re interested in working for after graduation. I decided to expand my options, leave my comfort zone, and do my externship in Faxe, Denmark.

         Why Denmark? Well, I have studied abroad twice before in Padova, Italy: first, studying physiologySidse (5th year veterinary student at the University of Copenhagen) and I with a patient recovering from a foreign body surgery. during the summer of 2012, and second, participating in a food safety and public health seminar during the summer of 2014. I consider each trip to have been an invaluable portion of my veterinary education as a rare opportunity to learn about veterinary methods and practices worldwide. Because of these past travels, I learned that outside the arena of scholastic learning, I really enjoy traveling and experiencing new cultures – especially those in Europe. I knew I wanted to spend at least part of my externship time at a foreign clinic.

         Denmark originally came up after hearing great things from some classmates who had previously studied abroad there with Dr. Wasser. While I was struggling to decide between countries, the Universe seemingly made my decision for me: my boyfriend, a law student at the University of Texas, had finalized his plans to study abroad for the fall semester in Copenhagen, Denmark. Knowing that I had a free place to stay in Copenhagen (a huge plus when you are living abroad as a student), having heard great things from Dr. Wasser, and having never visited the Nordic region of Europe previously, all of the pieces fell perfectly in place.

         The clinic where I worked in Denmark was called Evidensia