Hello, it's Anthony Chadwick from the webinar Vet, welcoming you to another episode of Vet Chat. Really pleased to have Camilla Edwards on the webinar. You've been on before, but last time we were talking all about sustainability.
This time, your other passion in life, ultrasonography. Yes, yeah, it's good to be back. Tell us a little bit just to remind people of you of your background.
Yeah. So, I am a veterinary surgeon. I grew up in the UK, but I went to university in Denmark.
My, both my parents are Danish, so I was lucky to be bilingual and I had that opportunity. But I came back to work in the UK and have mostly worked in GP practises and, in emergency and critical care. I've worked, yeah, in, in out of hours hospitals for 8 years of my career.
In 2018, I set up first opinion veterinary ultrasound, affectionately known as FOU. Yeah, and, started providing a peripatetic ultrasonography service, at that point. It's sort of grown and become, a teaching platform as well.
I had a lot of requests for, from people to, to start teaching. And found I really enjoyed that. So started, during the pandemic, providing online teaching, and since that, providing in practise teaching also.
And also, providing ultrasound machine reviews on my website. The the pandemic was obviously, you know, and it's still, I know people are still dying of COVID was a terrible time, but actually it encouraged a lot of businesses to like yourself to digitally transform and make use of the of the digital revolution that had been happening for several years before, didn't it? Absolutely.
I think, I had all these ideas in my head, but lacked the, the time or inclination to, actually get these ideas down and started. So, although it was a very tough time, homeschooling three children and supporting my GP husband who was setting up vaccination clinics and, and, and working in the NHS, it was, it was a stressful time. But, That, that allowed me to, without my in practise peripatetic work, during those 10 weeks, it gave me some time to focus on what my online ideas were.
So, yeah. And of course, . Going to Denmark, was it in Copenhagen that the vet school is, so it's a beautiful city as well, isn't it?
So it's, it, it's interesting to get another perspective, isn't it, from, how, how the Danes do things? Is it much different from the way that we do things in the UK? Oh, it's, it's, it's quite similar.
It's, I think at at the time there was a feeling that, Probably, how in the UK we possibly view the view the US. I don't, I'm not sure we see that so much anymore, but that people might, might go further with their small animal patients. They might do more, extravagant, things for their patients.
And maybe Denmark viewed the UK is doing that. But, I think it's fairly similar, these days. So, Camilla, I know you set up that first opinion veterinary ultrasound.
Was it 2017, 2018? 2018, 2018 and obviously. That was peripatetic service you were walking around, travelling around the the practises.
Obviously then COVID came, so you've added that sort of digital element to it. Tell us a little bit about how that's gone, you know, how many people have signed up for that and have you been able to develop that maybe into. Going back and teaching the vets how to use the ultrasound, because I think before you were going out and doing the ultrasound for the vets weren't you?
That was the concept of first opinion veterinary ultrasound. Yeah, yeah, so. The, yeah, the original concept was, you know, I'm, I'm not a specialist.
I, I'm effectively a, a locum with a special interest, that goes into practises and offers a high level GP, level, and hence the name of my business. So, yeah, when, when I started developing the online, courses, I really just wasn't sure that anyone would be interested in signing up to it. And actually, you know, I had a plan of what the course would be, but I thought, if nobody wants this, then I'm not gonna make it.
I'm not gonna spend that time. So I actually put it out there first and said, Do you want to sign up to this? You know, fairly low cost.
And, that first round, I had, over 25, vets sign up. So I thought, well, OK, I better make this thing. So, so made the course, and got, got great feedback.
And, and that was a 6 week course originally. I've split that into 24 week long courses, and, and updated it all. So I've got a, a basics course and a trickier bits course.
And yeah, I, I run each of those 3 times a year. And I'm getting about 30 students, on each course. So it's a, it's a nice number, for getting discussions going.
Yeah. So it, it's, it's taken off and it's, it, it grows each time as well. So, we're coming up to the 300 mark of students that have been been through the online courses.
So I think you're, you're a bit like me. I I similarly did peripatetic dermatology work and, I think that that the term is we're we're called gipsies aren't we? GPs with a special interest.
I think in the in the medical world as well. But mine was, mine was dermatology and. But it sounds like that's been really effective to help people start to get familiar with their machines, but of course it is difficult to sort of teach the concept of how you actually position the probe to get the lovely pictures that that you get.
So how have you managed that with the videos, but then also has that been augmented by the fact that you're now going out and showing people in practise as well? Yeah. So, the videos has been really interesting.
I've tried both, self-editing videos and having professional videographers come out and film. And what I found is that you really need the veterinary eye to know exactly what it is that, the vets who are learning, the students, what it is they want to see. So you both want close up, but you also want to know.
Orientate yourself because if you just see fur and a hand, it's very difficult to orientate yourself. So you need to be the right distance away, at the same time, you're seeing what's what happens on the image when you move your hand. So, trial and error, I've, I've learned that I need to edit those videos to get exactly what I need out of them.
So, it's been, been a lot of fun, and it's a, a new, skill that I've learned. But I've had a lot of positive feedback from that. But yes, I think sometimes when we're learning something that is a physical skill as well.
Which ultrasonography is, we don't always realise what we're doing. So while we're watching the screen, the student might not realise that their hand is actually moving. So that's the advantage with Me coming out and, and teaching in practise is that I can, I can let them know, Oh, did you know that your hand moved when you were doing that?
You, you did this because you're not always aware of what your, your hand's doing, when you're focusing on something else. So, yeah, that part of it, that element of it is difficult to deliver online. But certainly the delivering, what I, what I'm doing and where my hand position is, is possible online.
And I love the way that you actually talked about that at the start, that you actually went out to the vets. I think as we've also done at webinar vets and, you know, what do you actually want if we produce this? What would it look like?
What are the elements that you want to include? Because then you're producing something that's actually what the client wants rather than what you think they want, which can sometimes be very different, can't it? Yeah.
So that that's 100% how my business has grown. You know, I am constantly asking for feedback on what it is that, that, my students, my clients want, from my business. So, for example, the most, common thing we get from feedback at the end of the online courses is Where do I go now?
What, what ongoing support can I get? I, you know, they've enjoyed the discussion board where they've got feedback on cases that they're looking at and the images that they're producing on their machine. But where do they go now?
Because ultrasonography is, is a skill that takes a long time to develop. And we're all, I'm still learning. I, you know, we're, we're continuously learning with, with ultrasound.
So, but you need, need that support in some way. So, we currently got a, a small cohort of founding members on a membership, which is providing that support. And I'm really looking forward to in January opening that up to everybody.
But that's been, one of the, the, the main things is responding to what people, people are asking for. So, January, we're going to launch the the Fou Club, as it's going to be called. Brilliant.
It's It's such an important point and it's worth thinking, do we as vet practises ask our clients enough, are we offering the right services, because obviously it's a very traditional business. We know people are coming for vaccination to have their animals spayed, obviously when their animals are sick, but actually there could be things that they want from the practise that we're not even thinking about because of course we think as vets. And they obviously think as clients, you know, for the business, don't they?
So no, it's a, it's a really interesting point and I, I think it's something we've tried to do by the same thing, asking for lots of feedback. What's working, what isn't, what's good, what isn't, you know, how can we improve things. So, no, it's really useful.
Now I know that off the back of that, you've also developed on your site reviews for different ultrasound machines. And you actually have a, a quiz set up that actually helps the vets that, you know, come onto your site to decide, you know, what is the best ultrasound machine for them. So perhaps tell us a little bit about that.
So, again, that was one of my ideas that was burning in the back of my head, when it came to 2020, that because of the job that I was doing, I was, working as a peripatetic optionographer and I've worked in lots of different practises with lots of different ultrasound machines. I found people were coming to me, colleagues who I knew or people had sent their friends in my direction to ask what ultrasound machine should my practise get. So I was doing my best answering those questions and thinking, well, how can I How can I give an even better answer to this, this question?
So, yeah, in 2020 I started approaching. Ultrasound machine companies, and asking whether I could review their, their ultrasound machines, and put them on my, my website. So, understandably, some of them are a bit a little bit nervous about that, but most of them are very accommodating with that.
So, yeah, they'd they'd send me an ultrasound machine. Try to standardise what I was doing. So, in particular, getting specific views on my own dog, so that people can come.
Compare those images, and it's the same dog. She may have fluctuated a little bit in weight over the, over the years. But, yeah, essentially, that's probably is the best standard that that there is out there.
You know, it's all those images on, on the same dog. So people can compare and, and decide what machine, might suit their practise. And then recently, we've made a, a little quiz.
So you just need to answer a few questions, on your budget, and, what your practise is interested in using the ultrasound machine for. And it will give you, an answer. It will match you up with the perfect ultrasound machine for your practise.
So that, that's a little fun tool that I've, made on my website, that's also. Camilla, that's great. Really, looking forward, Camilla, you're gonna be doing a series for us in the next few weeks on, ultrasound generally, but obviously it's 3 webinars, the 3rd, the 10th, and the 17th of October.
Tell us a little bit about what you're gonna cover in the series, please. Yeah. So in the first webinar, we're gonna cover how to get the most out of your ultrasound machine.
And, that's with emphasis on your machine, because that's what, I really am interested in doing, you know, we, we all dream of having the best ultrasound machine. But it's just not practical in in every practise. And sometimes you need to get good on what you've got before it becomes financially viable to to upgrade your machine.
So. Because I have tried. A lot of machines out there.
I have the information to get you up and running on most machines. There, it's very rare that a machine stumps me, and I, I keep trying. I've got lots of connections in the with, with ultrasound machine companies.
So I can often get the, the manual, even if it's an old machine. And we can figure out how to, how to get you up and running. So, I've got lots of, Images of different ultrasound machines in that webinar where I'll show you how to find the buttons on your machine that are important to know about, and what they do and how they affect the image.
So that's webinar number one. We'll talk a bit about that. The second webinar we're gonna talk about the Fou guide to the complete abdominal ultrasound examination.
And we just look at how to, how to do a systematic, ultrasound examination. I think a lot of people worry that they might have missed something on ultrasound that they, That, that another vet might have seen something that they haven't seen. So it's really important to get that systematic, view of the whole abdomen down and, and understand when you can tick off that you've seen a particular organ and that you've seen everything in the abdomen.
So that's, that's, really key to getting good at ultrasound. And then in session 3, I'm gonna go through 10 small animal cases where ultrasound made a difference. So, particularly in cases where X-ray didn't get the answer or CT didn't get the answer, but a scan did, or yeah, where it's made a difference.
And these are all cases that I have done in GP practises. So it's all GP level stuff. And what sort of pros, what, what do you think for the, for the ideal practise, GP practise, what, what, probe should they have, you know, what, Different size probes.
Yeah, so, every small animal practise should start with a microconvex probe. I have turned up to in practise teaching where they've only had a phased array probe, which is ideal for cardiac scanning, but nothing else. So, .
Yeah, it's, it's important to start off with a micro convex probe. But even then, even if that's all you've got, you can still use it. You can still get some information out of it.
So, I really don't use your machine as an excuse, for not picking up the probe and giving it a go because even if you don't have the perfect kit, you still may get some useful information out of it for your patient that's right in front of you. I remember when I was first on the line of learning about dermatology, one of the things that I had to almost teach myself with a little bit of guidance from people like David Grant, who was my supervisor, was just do it, you know, learn how to stain things properly, get them under the microscope, look for things, take ear swabs, you know, prick pustules and look at them under the microscope. I think Gary Player said, you know, the more I practise, the luckier I get.
It's the same thing, I think with ultrasound, isn't it, that if you've got a dog that's out maybe for a castration up and you've got 20 minutes spare, you know, actually practise ultrasound in the bladder and the liver and the spleen and the kidneys, that's how you learn what the normal is and how you can see the difference when something abnormal picks comes up. Yeah, just start. Simple as that, just start.
And, and the more sort of normal patients at first, just you're getting used to how to handle the probe, what you're seeing, the more you do, the better you become, don't you? Exactly, exactly. That is, that's exactly it.
The more you do, the better you become. I was really interested about the membership that, you know, you're going to launch, in, in early 2023. Very much, you know, an ongoing support for people, helping them with choice of ultrasound if they want to upgrade, if they've got a difficult case, they can obviously send pictures through and things as well.
Is this how you see that developing as a sort of service for your, for your clients? Absolutely, yeah, that is, yeah, it's what it's what they're asking for. So, yeah, that's .
We've, we've already started with a small group. So we've got 1414 vets on there already, who are on there, giving me, giving me plenty of feedback, which is what I ask of them, so that we can just improve it and make it a, a really, really good experience for, for people, that they can get. The feedback on those cases.
Obviously, there's, there's limitations when you're, when you haven't held the scanner yourself. But that doesn't mean that there isn't any information you can get or have a, have a conversation about what, what to do next. So, absolutely, getting great feedback already, that, that, the content that we're putting out and yeah, the, the, the case discussions, it's all, all really good.
Having a mentor or a coach just quickens up your process, your progress. So as much as, you know, obviously I could practise, it was so important if I did get stuck that I could go to somebody like David or be it a course where I could ask somebody a question. And, and again, because it's digital now, it's so easy to do that because you can show the images as well as have the discussion, can't you.
So it sounds like a brilliant idea. Yeah. And I wish you every success with it.
Thank you. Camilla, it's been really interesting to speak to you as always. I'm really fascinated by what you're doing in the digital space to help people with ultrasound.
And, as I say, I hope the course continues to go well. Thanks very much, bye bye. Thank you.
