Diagnostics & Bloodwork

If you’ve been to your doctor for an annual physical, you likely have had blood drawn to help identify the status of various body functions and organs.  At Shamrock Animal Hospital, we subscribe to the recommendations of the American Veterinary Medical Association standards that bloodwork be done annually for our pets.  Keep in mind, your dog or cat ages the equivalent of 7 years for each calendar year.

 In late 2016, Shamrock Animal Hospital invested in the best and most current diagnostic equipment available in the animal health world in order to be able to accurately and quickly identify the source of problems that your pet may be having.

Marbles, dog toys, sewing needles, corn cobs, coins & batteries.  What these things all have in common is that dogs and cats are prone to swallowing them and many other things!  Our in-house, digital x-ray technology allows us to identify these conditions as well as broken bones, tumors and other conditions.

Regular diagnostics (blood, fecal and urinalysis) help Dr. Fagan and the Shamrock team to create a baseline reading of how all of your pets body functions are operating.   Even in healthy pets, there are times when routine bloodwork or diagnostics help us to identify potential health issues for your dog or cat at the very earliest stages.

Once your pet reaches 7 years of age, we expand the testing to identify  age-specific conditions, like hypothyroidism, that we typically see in pets who have begun to reach their golden years.  Having previous baseline numbers  from prior years helps us to see trends in your pet’s health and allows us to take corrective actions to minimize, as much as possible, the symptoms and signs of disease in your pet.

Our partnership with IDEXX Laboratories, the world’s leader in animal health diagnostics, has given us one particular test called SDMA that helps us to identify conditions that exist in the kidneys that may not show visible signs for many years.  Once an elevated SDMA level has been identified in a pet, we can take the simple steps of adjusting the pet’s diet so that we can avoid early kidney disease and help keep your pet happy and healthy.

You can learn more about this test and its benefits by visiting the IDEXX website:

 https://www.idexx.com/files/small-animal-health/solutions/articles/intro-kidney-test-sdma.pdf