Pet Blood Work in Prosper, TX
What blood work options are available for my pet and when would you be recommending them?
There are a lot of blood work options or different circumstances in which we recommend blood work be performed. Wellness blood work is typically discussed at the time of an annual appointment. Your pet is healthy, and we're visiting for an annual physical exam, then deciding together what blood work should be performed or if we need to perform it at all. For pets under the age of eight, it's thorough, but it's an abbreviated chemistry profile that looks at the liver, kidneys, blood sugar, electrolytes, and complete blood count. It looks at white blood cells, red blood cells, and platelets.
Every year, we recommend checking for heartworm disease, various tick illnesses, and checking the stool for any gastrointestinal parasites the pet could be carrying. For a healthy senior pet, eight years and above, the chemistry profile is a little more comprehensive and always includes a thyroid function test because, just like people, thyroid function tends to decline with age. If your pet is sick, presenting concerns or physical symptoms that we want to understand better, we perform lab work in the office in those circumstances. We have a full in-house laboratory that allows us to perform that same type of testing, along with radiographs and abdominal ultrasounds.
There are a number of testing modalities that would be applied in cases where you present with your pet not feeling well. We do a lot of anesthetic procedures in our office, and if we don't have current lab work within six weeks or so of the procedure, we typically recommend strongly that blood work be performed prior to the anesthesia. Those types of profiles are not quite as comprehensive, but enough for us to feel good about the anesthetic event. We would perform those the morning of the procedure.
How long does it take to get the results back from my wellness profiles?
Wellness profiles, we collect those samples and submit them to our reference laboratory. Turnaround is usually 48 to 72 hours. Sometimes it can be a little longer than that. In certain circumstances, you don't need immediate feedback, so it's okay to send those samples out. In our office, we're back in touch, and your doctor will visit about those results, usually within three to four days of samples being submitted.
If you’re ready to schedule an exam or would like to learn more about our veterinary services, we’d love to hear from you. Call (972) 942-4000 or email hello@prospernorthamc.com. We look forward to caring for your pet.