I think that they're very effective. Lab tests give us answers to many of our questions. Even if everything is, quote-unquote, normal, then that means it rules out things. Normal can be good in certain situations. We think about normal being good. But sometimes we think that that was a wasted test, but it's not because we have ruled out certain things, even if the numbers and values come back normal. Stress can cause an elevation in blood sugar, which is why we wouldn't get too excited about it if we saw that in a stressed pet.

That's a great question. Yes and no. Certain values might help us determine if there's a risk or an indication of cancer. But I typically say that there's not an exact cancer test on routine blood work. The thing with cancer is it can hide, and many times that can come up from pet to pet that the blood work looks great, but the pet still has a huge problem going on. It depends on the type of blood work that's run. One of the viral tests, feline leukemia, can be determined by a blood test. We worry about that causing cancer in cats.

Often it can. Combined with the physical exam and the history of clinical signs of what's going on at home, your cat could be diagnosed with certain diseases or problems.

Baseline is your pet's normal. We know the general normal values on a lab screen, but it's what your pet's normal is. And so, if we have a baseline and later there are some abnormalities, we know the degree of the abnormality based on your pet's baseline.

We may order that as a general baseline or wellness test to determine if your pet is hiding anything or having some reference values. The other time is most likely when your cat isn’t feeling well, and they can't tell us why they don't feel well, so we'll run specific lab tests to help determine what's wrong.