Vet Gazette

Dr. Jean Hall is researching the effects of feeding selenium-fortified hay to cattle as a method of improving their health. The outcome of her research is expected to influence how cattle health issues are addressed.

Hall receives support for her research from the Agricultural Research Foundation, an organization that is unique to Oregon.

“Funding I have received through the ARF Competitive Grant Funding has played a significant role in helping my colleagues and I advance this frontier to discover best practices in (selenium) supplementation,” Hall said.

The importance of selenium has been known for decades, but the most effective method of delivery to cattle is still being investigated. Hall said in the report that she believes “increasing the bioavailable concentrations of selenium in forage through the use of selenium fertilizer is the most economical and practical method to provide supplementation to cattle.”

Hall is using her 2016-2018 grant on the focus of feeding selenium-enriched alfalfa hay to weaned beef calves for eight weeks to see if it improves performance and health.

Hall said she “believes (selenium supplementation) can be readily adapted to Oregon cattle production systems.”

The Oregon Humane Society honored heroic people and pets at the annual Diamond Collar Awards Luncheon in February. Among the award winners was Picasso, a former client of the OSU Veterinary Teaching Hospital who became a social media superstar and taught the world that it’s okay to look different, and Dr. Doug McInnis, an OSU alum who created the Klamath County Animal Control Task Force which works to end animal neglect and abuse.

Recipients of the awards are selected for their kindness, diplomacy, resiliency and courage. Their inspiring stories represent OHS’s vision of a more humane society.

Watch a video about Dr. McInnis’ work here:

With a goal of engaging in difficult dialogues in order to advance a diverse and inclusive veterinary profession, a contingent from the Carlson College of Veterinary Medicine participated in the Iverson Bell Regional Summit last month.

“It was an opportunity to discuss issues of inclusivity and diversity with students, faculty and staff from other veterinary programs in the west,” says Dean Sue Tornquist. “The group was small enough to facilitate great discussions, but large enough to learn about best practices, ideas, and concerns that have come up in other veterinary schools.”

The Dean provided scholarship for two students to attend: Genny Cobarrubias and David Smith. They were chosen based on short essays they submitted.

“I went as a representative from the college’s diversity committee,” said Smith, “I also went to listen and learn. I think diversity and inclusion are important, and it was interesting to see what other schools are doing to try to address these issues.”

The College of Veterinary Medicine’s Diversity Committee is charged with developing strategies and actionable items to foster a community of diversity and inclusion.

“While diversity and inclusion have long been important for the CVM, it becomes even more important to take significant steps in this direction as our entering class of 2021 includes 24% students from under-represented minority backgrounds,” says Tornquist.

Smith is also president of the Student Chapter of the Veterinary Medical Association, and as such wants to use that platform to promote diversity issues and programs.

Genny Cobarrubias is interested in diversity issues because she comes from a diverse background. “Growing up in Hood River I never knew anybody who was a veterinarian,” she says. “And, as a student there, I was the only [latina]who was interested in science.”

She is currently building the groundwork for a new student club called Voice (Veterinarians as One Inclusive Community for Empowerment). “Iverson Bell was an opportunity to meet Voice members from other universities,” she says, “and learn about what they are doing.”

Both Smith and Cobarrubias are interested in organizing outreach to diverse groups of young people to encourage their interest in the veterinary profession.

“There aren’t many people of color who are veterinarians,” says Cobarrubias. “So I want to be a role model, reaching out to young people, encouraging them and letting them know ‘You can do this’.” She also plans to pursue these goals as a practicing veterinarian in the near future, reaching out through internships and job shadowing opportunities for high school kids.

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Enid Traisman from the Dove Lewis Pet Loss Support Program will be at the Carlson College of Veterinary Medicine presenting a workshop on Grief Counseling. She will teach skills that veterinary professionals can use to help clients in times of grief and loss, and lead a round-table discussion for students and staff to ask questions about pet loss support groups, grief, coping mechanisms, and other topics of interest.

The workshop will be held in room 102 of Magruder Hall on Wednesday, April 4th from 5:00-6:30 PM.

In order to make this session as informative as possible, Enid has requested that we generate a list of topics that interest us. If you plan to attend, please fill out this survey by Friday, March 16th: https://goo.gl/forms/hYkWwQxiq6hehAgA3.”>https://goo.gl/forms/hYkWwQxiq6hehAgA3

One of the big new technologies in biomedical science is the use of genome sequencing, which allows scientists to decipher and map the DNA of all kinds of organisms and diseases. This technology has produced massive amounts of data, but the pace of data generation has largely outstripped researchers’ ability to make sense of the results.

The National Center for Advancing Translational Sciences (NCATS) has launched a multiyear effort to develop a Biomedical Data Translator that integrates multiple types of existing data sources, including signs and symptoms of disease, drug effects, and biological data relevant to understanding disease.

In the Department of Biomedical Sciences at the Carlson College of Veterinary Medicine, Dr. Stephen Ramsey was recently awarded funding to work on the NCATS project.  “We’re funded to build a software tool for mining biomedical knowledge-bases, and for reasoning based on information from these knowledge-bases. We hope the final product will be able to answer questions (expressed in natural language) such as “what genetic conditions might be protective against osteoporosis” or “how does fenbendazole reduce parasite load?”. The award of $437, 000 is the first of two phases of funding.

The project is a collaboration between OSU, the Institute for Systems Biology, and Ohio State University.

After many discussions with cohort groups, and repeated tweaking of the space design, plans for the Magruder Hall expansion have been finalized and ground breaking is scheduled for June.

Why June? “We wanted to wait until after Pet Day,” says Dean Susan J. Tornquist.

One big hurdle in the design process has been the continually rising cost of construction since the project was green lighted in early 2017. Recent disasters like the fires in California and the hurricanes in the south have driven up the cost of both materials and labor.

“A number of adjustments had to made to our plans due to a sharp increase in construction costs,” says Tornquist. “But we’re still doing it. Never give up!” The biggest priority in the construction timeline is getting the new lecture hall done. “We are adding sixteen more students each year for the next three years, so we need the space as soon as possible,” says Tornquist.