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VeterinarySmall animal clinical techniques
You draw 7 cards: 2 of the 4 Part A skills and 5 of the 13 Part B skills, and you perform them on live animals and models while you explain each one to the examiner, in any order, all within 45 minutes. It is station 3 (SAM03) of the Small Animal Medicine section of the ECFVG Clinical Proficiency Examination.
Free to startScenarios
- Part A: 2 cards drawn at random from the 4 skills (cystocentesis, thoracocentesis, abdominocentesis, urinary catheter in a male dog).
- Part B: 5 cards drawn at random from the 13 skills (heart sounds, jugular venipuncture, antibiotic dose, cruciate ligament, urine specific gravity, PCV and TP, patellar reflex, skin scraping, cranial nerves, fine needle aspirate, Schirmer tear test, fluorescein stain, proprioception).
The steps
- Draw 2 of the 4 Part A cards and 5 of the 13 Part B cards; you can look at your cards the whole time.
- Explain to the examiner what you are doing as you demonstrate or perform each technique.
- Part A, cystocentesis: gather the equipment, describe and show how to locate the bladder on a live animal, and do the cystocentesis on a stuffed animal model.
- Part A, thoracocentesis: gather the equipment, describe how to do it on a live animal and show the technique on a stuffed animal model.
- Part A, abdominocentesis: gather the equipment, describe how to do it on a live animal and show the technique on a stuffed animal model.
- Part A, urinary catheter in a male dog: gather the equipment, describe the technique and show the passage of a catheter on a suction tube model.
- Part B: listen to 2 cardiac sounds, say if each is normal or abnormal and, if abnormal, the type of murmur or arrhythmia.
- Part B: gather the equipment for a jugular venipuncture and show how to do it.
- Part B: calculate and draw up the correct dose of an antibiotic from the dosage and the size of the animal.
- Part B: test the integrity of the cranial cruciate ligament on a dog with a suspected rupture.
- Part B: measure a urine specific gravity and say if the cat's kidneys are concentrating the urine appropriately.
- Part B: from a blood sample in an EDTA tube, describe how to get the packed cell volume (PCV) and total protein (TP), and read both from a prepared sample.
- Part B: test the patellar reflex and describe how a spinal lesion could change it.
- Part B: do a skin scraping for suspected demodex on a live animal and a model.
- Part B: do one cranial nerve test (menace response, facial sensation, gag reflex or pupillary light reflex), describe the expected response and name the cranial nerves tested.
- Part B: do a fine needle aspirate on a fruit model and prepare a slide for analysis.
- Part B: do a Schirmer tear test and interpret the result.
- Part B: do a fluorescein stain and interpret the result.
- Part B: do a proprioceptive exam and interpret the result.
- Finish all 7 skills within the 45 minutes, in the order you choose.
Safety rules that stop the station
- Handle every animal humanely and safely: the examiner can take points off or stop the station with a zero.
- Describing or doing a procedure in a way that would seriously harm or kill an animal patient, on a live animal or a model, is a fatal flaw: zero for the station and the whole Small Animal Medicine section fails.
To pass
- The sheet scores 100 points: Part A 40 (2 skills done correctly and efficiently) and Part B 60 (5 skills).
- The station is 20% of the Small Animal Medicine section, which needs 60 weighted points to pass.
Official source
AVMA · ECFVG CPE
Manual of Administration for the Clinical Proficiency Examination
The AVMA publishes the CPE Manual of Administration free: every station, its assessment sheet and the score needed to pass.
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