by jamieimada

What’s in a test?

A close friend of mine had a bit of a veterinary emergency question recently. Long story short, it called for a trip in to make sure everything was ok. A fear, they said, was that they were going to bring the pet in, spend money on diagnostics, only to have everything be ok. This is a common sentiment among many if not all veterinary clients, and I can understand it. However, I’d like to state that there is great value in having a ‘negative’ test.

For example: Doing ‘baseline’ blood work on our pets when they are healthy. When you get the news that all looks good it lets you know that a) there aren’t any signs on the blood work that indicate organ dysfunction b) a point of reference for later down the road when you run blood work when your pet isn’t on the top of your game. What changes and what stays the same. If we find that when our pets are in good health but have a certain white blood cell that is on the low end of the normal range we can better interpret changes in these cells when our pet is sick.

Another example: Your pet ran into a parked car, yes it has and does happen! So your pet became overzealous chasing something and ran into a car. They seem a bit off, and painful. So there are essentially 4 outcome:

  1. You don’t take them in and they are ok, just painful
  2. You don’t take them in and they become worse needing emergent and critical care
  3. You bring them in and all is fine on exams and they go home with some pain meds
  4. You bring them in and they need immediate care and treatment

Option 1 is obviously the cheapest but again you don’t know if it is the true state. Plus you still have a painful animal, and now you’re worrying overnight.
Option 2 is extremely risky, with situations that need emergency care, time is everything.
Option 3 and 4 they cost money yes, but they also give you piece of mind as well as let you have your pets treated promptly. Earlier interventions provide better and more economical results.

So when you get good results, normal results, don’t think that you ran them for nothing. You ran them for your piece of mind and for your pets health and well being too!