3 Dec 2025
The challenging two-minute quiz is running until 24 December
Chris Simpson
Job Title
A veterinary referral centre has launched an oncology-themed Christmas quiz designed to help vet teams identify mast cell tumours (MCTs).
AURA Veterinary in Surrey has launched the image-based diagnostic challenge AURA Advent Quiz: The 12 Mast Cells of Christmas.
The puzzle, which is open to all vets, VNs, students and non-clinical staff until 24 December, presents 24 photographs of suspicious masses from AURA’s clinical archive.
Participants are challenged with identifying which 12 are MCTs, with the answers to be revealed after the event.
The quiz was trialled internally at the referral hospital, with the results revealing a “humbling” insight into why the exercise is so valuable: the highest score was nine, with one MCT only being correctly identified by 17% of staff.
Several non-MCT images were incorrectly identified by more than 70% of the participants. On average, nurses fared slightly better than vets.
AURA hopes the quiz will serve as a stark message to veterinary professionals that MCTs are difficult to identify by sight alone even for seasoned vets, in contrast to a fine needle aspirate which is “quick, easy and inexpensive, and gives a high chance of a diagnosis”.
Completing the quiz is said to take just two minutes and the participant with the highest score will win the Color Atlas of Canine and Feline Surgical Oncology textbook co-authored by one of AURA’s cancer surgeons.
