Merck Vet Manual and VetMedAcademy Sponsored Contest Yields “COVID Educational Creations” Learning Module for Veterinary Students

Earlier on in quarantine, VetMedAcademy and the Merck Veterinary Manual sponsored a contest to identify those who have discovered and deployed innovative online approaches to reaching and encouraging interaction with their distant students. 

A link to the learning module, which consists of 13 examples developed from the winning educational resources, may be accessed (free registration is required) at www.vetmedacademy.org/covid-educational-creations-contest-page. The names of the award winners and the titles of their entries are listed on this page.  

All of the submitted educational resources are shared on VetMedAcademy.org.

VetMedAcademy and the Merck Veterinary Manual sought entries from instructors who had “turned lemons into lemonade.” The relevant topics included any in veterinary medicine and/or animal health, and all instructors (faculty, resident, intern or other) in veterinary or veterinary technician programs were eligible to apply. Evidence of positive student feedback was in some cases submitted to strengthen the instructor’s entry.  

The submissions were reviewed on creativity and instructional merit by four judges: a practicing veterinarian, a recent veterinary graduate and past chair of the educational committee of the International Veterinary Students Association (IVSA), a veterinary specialist and editor, and an educationalist specializing in online education.

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Merck Manuals Vet Student Bloggers to Provide Timely Commentary in New Year

Kenilworth, N.J. (January 2019) – An eclectic lineup of veterinary students, writing for the Merck Manuals Vet Student Stories blog, will share their experiences while in school and offer takes on newsworthy issues that emerge in 2019.

Posts are organized into these categories:

• Vet Student Experience
• Vet School Advice
• Clinical Experience
• Human-Animal Bond
• Maintaining Balance
• Trending Topics

The diverse team of nine contributors is composed of veterinary students at various stages of study from a variety of universities in North America.

Blog entries range from a must-read for students on balancing social life, academic success, and physical wellness, to a touching recount of a visit to a shelter that stresses techniques for fear-free handling of homeless animals.

The veterinary student blog can be accessed at vetstudentstories.merckmanuals.com.

Merck Manuals Student Stories is a collaboration between active students and The Merck Manuals, a series of reference books about human and animal health, the content of which is available online.

Online Resource for Animal Health Professionals

MerckVetManual.com offers authoritative guidelines for the diagnosis, treatment, and prevention of disorders and diseases in companion, exotic, laboratory, and food animals, as well as contributor editorials, a newsfeed, quizzes and case studies, and interactive tools.

Provided as a public service by Merck & Co., Inc., access to the website is free, unlimited, and there is no registration. The user experience is never compromised by advertising or commercial messaging.

Book and Free App

The Merck Veterinary Manual was first published in 1955 and is now in its 11th edition.

Nearly 400 veterinary experts from academia, government, research organizations, and specialty practices contributed to the latest update of the book.

The Merck Veterinary Manual is available as a mobile app for Apple and Android devices and can be downloaded at no charge.

About Merck 

For more than a century, Merck, a leading global biopharmaceutical company known as MSD outside of the United States and Canada, has been inventing for life, bringing forward medicines and vaccines for many of the world’s most challenging diseases.

Updated Merck Vet Manual App Is Now Free

A link to The Merck Vet Manual App as well as many other veterinary apps that are useful for coursework, clinics, and studying for the NAVLE are available under the Vet Gazette's Resources tab.

The Merck Vet Manual App has been completely updated and is now free, digitally enhancing all of the information in The Merck Veterinary Manual and making it readily available anytime, anywhere.

The new app is the most comprehensive mobile resource for veterinarians, veterinary students, veterinary nurses and technicians, and other animal health professionals. Conveniently accessible on multiple handheld devices, the app provides authoritative guidelines for the diagnosis, treatment, and prevention of disorders and diseases in companion, exotic, laboratory, and food animals.

The mobile app offers:

• Thousands of topics written by more than 400 veterinary experts from more than 20 countries 
• Thousands of photos, illustrations, and videos of disorders and diseases
• Clinical calculators
• Numerous reference guides and hundreds of useful tables

All of this material resides on the device so accessing it does not use data, and after installation an internet connection is not needed.

For Apple devices, download the app at the App Store. For Android devices, download the app at Google Play. 

App and Online Reference Digitally Enhance the Book

When connected to the internet, the app can access many features found on the online reference at www.merckvetmanual.com, including quizzes and case studies, news and commentary, and pet health content written in consumer-friendly language for sharing with clients. 

“Both the online reference and the app are based on the latest edition of the book, but the digital platforms are enhanced by multimedia content, interactive tools, and more,” said Scott Line, DVM, PhD, DACVB, editor-in-chief of The Merck Veterinary Manual. 

Provided as a public service, access to the online reference is free and there is no registration. The user experience on the website and on the app is not compromised by advertising or commercial messaging. Both digital platforms are regularly updated to reflect emerging topics in veterinary medicine.

The Merck Veterinary Manual

Nearly 400 veterinary experts from academia, government, research organizations, and specialty practices contributed to the 11^th edition, which was introduced in July 2016, updating the previous edition published in 2010.

The latest edition is the first to feature a section dedicated to public health, covering public health functions and agencies, epidemiologic principles, disease outbreak investigations, food safety, and an extensive table of zoonoses.   

The Merck Veterinary Manual has been trusted by animal health professionals since 1955, when Merck & Co., Inc. first published the book. 

About Merck

For more than a century, Merck, a leading global biopharmaceutical company known as MSD outside of the United States and Canada, has been inventing for life, bringing forward medicines and vaccines for many of the world’s most challenging diseases.

App Review: The Merck Veterinary Manual

The Merck Veterinary Manual, 10th edition app (iTunes page here)
Cost: $49.99

This is the Merck Veterinary Manual you’ve come to know and love but now in a mobile form.  It is the 10th edition, and is available for both your iPhone and optimized for iPad. The mobile Manual is divided into both “Outline” form (organized by body system), and “Topics” which includes everything from aardvark nutrition to zygomycosis. There is also a search function and favorites list where you can bookmark the sections you reference the most.

 

The different navigation methods make it pretty easy to find what you are looking for. There are pictures, audio, and video included, with over 1,100 color photos.  References sections are linked within each article so you can quickly jump around to the pertinent information you need.

I’ve been using this app on my small animal internal medicine and emergency/critical care rotations and so far it has proven a handy resource to help read up on my cases, since it has a little bit on just about everything.  I especially like the table formats used for everything from pharmaceuticals to poisonous plants, because concise, quick information is important to me.  I’ve been using it in conjunction with a differentials resource like Saunders “Small Animal Medical Differential Diagnosis” to prepare for cases. 

 

If you are interested in checking out what the Manual has to offer before purchasing this app, check out the free online  9th edition here .  The 10th edition lists updated content and 10 new chapters as an advancement upon the previous edition. 

Straight from Merck, here is what you are getting:

• 1,100+ full-color images for enhanced understanding

• Audio and video examples

• Extensive use of tables and charts

• Cross-reference links to related topics

• Diagnosis and treatment of domestic, exotic, and laboratory animals

• Universal Index Search – find topics across all indexes

• ‘Favorites’ for bookmarking important entries

• Optimized iPad interface

The app has a slightly more user friendly navigation and search options than the online version in my opinion, and the “Favorites” feature is nice to tag pages you want to look at later.  Overall, as a student reviewing for the NAVLE and navigating clinical rotations, I think this app is a handy one to have!