Day-1 competencies for swine-interested veterinary graduates

Basic Competencies for swine veterinary practice

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Pig handling

• Identify a pig with a marker
• Pick up a piglet from a crate
• Stand safely next to a sow or a boar
• Restrain a piglet for venipuncture or IM injections

Swine husbandry

• Take the rectal temperature of a pig
• Identify a non-thriving or unhealthy pig (i.e. requiring attention) within a group
• Give an intramuscular injection to a piglet and weaner pig
• Choose the appropriate needle length and gauge based on the pig age, weight and product recommendation
• Administer a medicine intra-nasally
• Drain an abscess
• Identify all organs in a pig (e.g. tonsils, lymph nodes, adrenals, spleen vs liver…)
• Recognize when animals need to be euthanized
• Resuscitate a pig
• Identify behavioral challenges (e.g. tail and flank biting, belly nosing, and sham chewing)
• Educate farm personnel to recognize neglect and animal abuse

Sample collection

• Collect swab samples (e.g. nasal, oropharyngeal, rectal, vaginal)
• Properly label, package and submit samples for diagnostics
• Record keeping and results interpretation
• Interpret a diagnostic report (e.g. serology, bacteriology, molecular biology)
• Interpret an antimicrobial susceptibility testing report
• Evaluate the results of a diagnostic report based on sensitivity, specificity, predictive value, and prevalence

Clinical reasoning

• Identify indicators of disease (e.g. dyspnea, coughing, posture, diarrhea, paddling, piling…)
• Identify foreign and reportable animal diseases in swine (ASF, CSF, Aujeszky…)

Treatment and prevention

• Calculate medicine dosages
• Write a prescription

Biosecurity

• Enter and exit a farm following a biosecurity protocol: without showering

Communication

• Take a relevant history of a case or a herd
• Provide a treatment of action plan for a given animal or the whole herd
• Communicate case findings to a client orally
• Presentation of pros and cons to the client
• Write a case report with recommendations for a client

Regulatory

• Complete domestic health papers for interstate shipment
• Complete international health papers for international shipment
• Be familiar with exotic diseases/reportable diseases
• Know how to report a Foreign Animal Disease to the State official
• Know how to report animal cruelty or animal abuse

Intermediate Competencies for swine veterinary practice

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Pig handling

• Move pigs from one pen to another (with or without a board, rattle…)
• Snare a pig

Swine husbandry

• Assess the body condition of a sow
• Measure the back fat of a sow
• Assess if a sow is in heat
• Inseminate a sow
• Perform a pregnancy diagnosis on a female pig
• Give a peri-vulvar injection to induce a sow
• Recognize when a sow needs assistance during farrowing
• Sleeve a sow / assist during farrowing
• Give an intramuscular injection to a sow in a stall or in a pen
• Eartag a pig
• Castrate a piglet
• Clip a piglet’s needle teeth
• Dock a piglet’s tail
• Repair an inguinal hernia
• Fix splay-legged piglets with tape
• Recommend the appropriate and approved euthanasia method based on pig age and weight, clinical situation, and employee safety
• Euthanize a piglet with CO2
• Euthanize a pig with a captive bolt gun or via intravenous injection
• Assess the suitability of a gilt for selection
• Set up water medication device (e.g. Dosatron)

Sample collection

• Collect oral fluids with a rope
• Take a blood sample (e.g. jugular vein of young and adult animals, ear vein)
• Perform a pig necropsy (young and adult animals)
• Collect a full set of tissues from a pig
• Collect feed and water for testing
• Calculate the number of pigs necessary to sample to detect a pathogen depending on the population size and the disease prevalence

Record keeping and results interpretation

• Interpret barn-level recorded information (e.g. sow cards, barn/treatment sheet)
• Interpret production records (e.g. sow farm, grow-finish, marketing reports)
• Recognize when a production parameter deviates from expected performance
• Select the appropriate diagnostic test depending on clinical signs, the disease differential and the farm situation
• Identify bacterial post-mortem contaminants on a bacteriology report

Clinical reasoning

• Perform a walk-through of a swine unit
• Define differential diagnoses for high-priority problems
• Work up a farrowing scour case
• Work up a post weaning scour case
• Work up a reproductive failure
• Work up a respiratory case
• Work up a CNS case
• Develop an initial treatment plan or immunization strategy

Treatment and prevention

• Use AMDUCA to select appropriate antimicrobials
• Identify which  antibiotics can not be used extralabel
• Be familiar with the common drug classes, active principles and trade names used in swine medicine
• Design a treatment protocol
• Design a herd vaccination plan
• Calculate water medication mixing proportions
• Write a VFD

Biosecurity

• Enter/exit a farm following a biosecurity protocol: shower-in, shower-out
• Load and unload pigs in a trailer without breaching biosecurity
• Introduce/remove materials into/from a farm respecting biosecurity protocols
• Evaluate the biosecurity level of a farm / perform a biosecurity audit
• Identify major biosecurity risks in a swine facility

Communication

• Write a visit report including an intervention plan for a client or production personnel
• Create a partial budget to evaluate interventions

Advanced Competencies for swine veterinary practice

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Swine husbandry

• Collect a blood swab from a boar
• Collect semen from a boar
• Assess the suitability of the environment based on pig age and weight
• Trim feet
• Detusk a boar
• Perform a C-section on a female pig
• Vascetomize or epididymectomize a boar
• Perform a swine welfare audit
• Evaluate housing design based on the needs and the age of the animals

Record keeping and results interpretation

• Identify how production parameters can be influenced
• Work through a false positive/false negative case
• Interpret financial records

Clinical reasoning

• Prioritize a problem list in the context of welfare, health and production performances
• Revise a proposed treatment plan or immunization strategy based on client expectations and economic considerations.

Biosecurity

• Provides a written biosecurity plan that is auditable
• Develop a gilt isolation and acclimatization plan
• Perform a transport biosecurity assessment (audit)
• Identify high biosecurity risk areas in a feedmill

Communication

• Make a decision tree to evaluate interventions