The project continues...

This fall term meant the continuation of my research project. I'm excited and cant wait until its completed! I had ran into a few issues at the end of last term, one of which involved the State of California. Originally my project was to cover family physicians and small animal veterinarians in four states, Texas, Florida, New York, and California. My reasoning was since I am covering a subject matter center around zoonotic diseases, the combination of these states would cover pretty much all of the zoonotic diseases that would be prevalent in the United States.

Zoonotic diseases vary from area to area due to many circumstances including climate, population density (I.e. diseases carried by white tail deer are not typically found in heavily populated cities), native species of wildlife, the level of agriculture in a given area, and the financial stability of an area (I.e. people financially stable travel more frequently, including out the country, exposing them to zoonotic disease). I called the licensing board for the State of California to inquire about having a contact list of small animal veterinarians. I was told I needed to fax a letter with my intent and their legal department would determine if they could release the information to me. I did so really expecting to hear they would release the information to me, since I was only asking for contact information, the same information a pet owner could acquire when looking for veterinary assistance. I was told they could not release that information to me....so, I no longer included California in my study.

Since the spring I also added a subtopic of what other countries, such as the UK, are doing...are they encouraging communication between both medical profession and if so, how? I would like to be able to compare and contrast where our medical think we are at to what another country, similar to our own, is at.

If you've been following to see how things are going, stay tuned...over the next couple of weeks there will be more to say....