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Originally Posted by bjh  At what age do they recommend the blood panel? I have heard that vaccinations can interfere with those results too. |
We try to do them at their 8 week checkups but if they are too small or too wiggly I will usually bring them back at 10 weeks just for the blood draw. So far we have not seen a bad result on the blood panels. If we ever would, we would just retest a few weeks after all vaccines are done and hang on to the puppy longer. We do not make our puppies available to be reserved until this test has come back normal.
Tina I agree with you on the food...which is one reason I just do not trust the test. We get several e-mails from people asking for advice and recently I talked to a lady whose yorkie was eating RC Yorkie food (28% protein), she had very high BA's post was over 100. The dog was clinically normal. She had a clear ultrasound and the vet knowing that they will not all show up recommended surgery to correct the suspected shunt and a biopsy. They went in for the surgery, found no shunt and did a biopsy of the liver...which came back normal. Oh yea and the dog which was to be shown was also spayed...
They switched her diet and re-tested 6 weeks after getting the results and wouldn't you know...her BA's were normal. How devastating. I think BA's are a good test but I also think they create a lot of unnecessary stressful panic. Our yorkies that are bred have a full blood panel done on a regular basis.
I really wish there was an easy answer and a full proof test.
I will say that Dr. Tobias recommended to our vet to have us do a liver biopsy at 2 years old, prior to breeding. I personally think this is too invasive.