What can blood tests help a veterinarian detect?

Quite a lot. Laboratory tests in dogs allow us to get information from things or organs, perhaps internally, that we can't otherwise determine from an outward exam. And that's the best way to look at it. Because I can put my hands on a dog, I can look at things, and I can check their color and listen to their heart and do all those kinds of things. But I can't tell you what their liver function is. I can't tell you what their kidney function is. I can't tell you what their blood sugar is. So that's where laboratory tests come in and give us answers that we may not otherwise be able to see from the outside.

It depends on the type of blood test that we're running. A complete blood count, for instance, would perhaps detect anemia, which is a low red cell count, or it might detect infection, which would be a high white cell count.

Chemistry would be another example, and for that we would look at the organ values. There are many different blood tests that we can do to look at a pet’s hormones and look for diseases that a pet might be carrying. So there's a variety of blood tests.

There are certain lab tests that we may recommend across the board for any dog, and then there are certain lab or blood tests that we would recommend depending on your dog's risk or what's going on with your pet. If your dog is sick or the area you live in may determine the type of lab work that we run.