My pet's blood work shows high HCT and low MCHC. What's next?

We use blood tests in combination with clinical exams and thresults of the latter, and clinical signs in order to assess a condition. the result of this assessment then determines whether we need to treat. That said, if your dog has no relevant clinical signs of illness, these numbers are not concerning. The MCV and MCH are parameters which reflect the amount of hemoglobin in the red blood cells. His hematocrit is relatively normal. Normal values vary per laboratory, and his hemoglobin corresponds with the hematocrit as well as the MCV and MCH. Really, for an old dog like Spike , these results by themselves are not worrisome. And since your vet is not concerned, apparently there are no clinical signs of disease that would make these values significant.

Much more information would be required in order to make any sense or use of blood results, a summary of what has been concerning you, her signs and symptoms and response to any previous treatment i would be required at a minimum. It is unusual to have a high RBC/HCT (more than normal red blood cells )and low MCH/MCHC (usually found when recovering from anaemia). This may indicate the red blood cell production process is gone wrong and an examination of the cells under a microscope by a specialist pathologist and possible bone marrow biopsy may be required. Occasionally accidental exposure to human medications used to promote blood production can produce similar results

Hello, and thank you for your question. It is difficult to interpret the results accurately without a medical history, however, in general: - white cell count is within normal range, indicating no sign of infection or inflammation - hemoglobin and PCV are slightly high, which usually indicates mild dehydration. This can be due to not drinking much water for a few hours prior to the blood sample, or from fluid losses through vomiting or diarrhea - MCV is an indicator of red cell size, which is only relevant if the pet is anemic (which Coco is not). I hope this helps, and that Coco is doing okay!

It's difficult to interpret lab work without some information on what symptoms the pet is having, why the test was run, etc. Without more information, all I can really say is that this CBC shows an elevated red blood cell count, which may indicate that the pet is dehydrated or can be a variation of normal in some pets. The white blood cell counts are mildly decreased, which can indicate some type of infection or, again, may not have any particular clinical significance. Feel free to post again with more information about what your pet is doing that concerns you, if you wish.

GGT can be a liver indicator, but does not mean anything when it is the only liver enzyme elevated. It means that the sample was likely hemolyzed, giving a false reading. Mildly elevated HCT and HGB mean that your pet may have had mild dehydration when the sample was taken. The elevated RETIC means that your pet was regenerating his red blood cells which can be due to an underlying immune mediated disorder, blood loss, or decreased blood cell production. However there are no other markers seen (RBCs are normal) to corroborate any of these situations, so a blood smear evaluation can be done to try and find more clues about what the high RETIC count means, or if it is also a false reading. The mildly low EOS is not a significant finding when this is low, only when this value is high, which can indicate a parasitic problem. I hope this helps! Best wishes and take care.

Thank you for sending over the copies of Gonzie's blood work! Looking at the provided results, I see that his creatinine is a tiny bit elevated. This value increases with kidney damage or dehydration. I'd certainly recommend talking to his vet about rechecking his kidney function in a month or two, as well as running a urinalysis to see how well his kidneys are working to concentration his urine. The monocyte increase is extremely mild. I don't worry when this type of white blood cell increases a tiny bit while other white blood cell lines (especially the neutrophils and lymphocytes) are normal. Stress alone can trigger this minor elevation. The RDW helps to give the proportions of the red blood cells' size and volume. Again, this minor elevation does not seem to be significant. A 50% hematocrit is slightly elevated, which means that Gonzie has some extra red blood cells. I would much rather see too many red blood cells than too few! His blood volume could also be more concentrated if he's a bit dehydrated. Platelets can be challenging to read on CBCs since they can clump together, so the machine may read a clump of several platelets as just one single cell. In these cases, it's always useful to manually examine a blood smear under the microscope to determine if adequate numbers of platelets are present. Nothing on the provided lab work makes me terribly concerned at this moment, but I do think it's worth tracking his kidney values and confirming an accurate platelet count. I hope that everything goes well for Gonzie!

Sure thing. All values appear to be within normal limits. There are some suspected nucleated rbc's, but this doesn't really mean much since all over values are normal. Thanks for visiting Petco Pet Education Center, formerly Petcoach and If you have further questions or would like to go over your pets case more in detail feel free to repost with additional information (i.e. symptoms) about your pet Bubble. Best wishes and take care.