Assessing veterinary students' attitudes towards pain in cattle before and after final-year clinical training.

Clinical training improves cattle pain recognition but does not significantly change analgesic prescription practices.

This prospective cohort study evaluated how clinical training influences veterinary students' pain recognition and management attitudes in cattle. Sixty Bavarian veterinary students completed identical questionnaires before and after 12 weeks of ruminant clinic training. Results demonstrated that practical clinical experience significantly improved students' recognition of pain behavioral expressions, with six parameters selected more frequently post-training. Pain severity scoring changed for 10 of 20 conditions and 3 of 15 procedures, with enucleation, claw amputation, and caesarean section identified as most painful in adult cattle, while castration and laparotomy ranked highest in calves. However, analgesic selection remained largely unchanged except for tenotomy management. Notably, clinical exposure modified students' perceptions of farmer attitudes toward pain and willingness to pay for anesthetics. The study acknowledges potential bias from high female participation. Key finding: practical experience enhances pain recognition but does not consistently translate to improved analgesic prescribing patterns in cattle.

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