Cat blood is red sticky stuff –  right? Not so…  If you attempt to take blood from a distressed cat it can affect the results and your assessment.

Less Stress = Better Samples = Better Diagnostics

Lab results depend on good sampling technique.  Poor samples do no one any favours!  Cat blood is a bit tricky – it is fragile, comes in small amounts, clots quickly AND has to be removed from a small, wriggly and even resistant furperson!

Patience and preparation are the keys!

In these videos, I show you how to make the most of what you can easily get from your feline patients – in the feline friendliest manner! Better samples = better diagnostics, so your cats can be on their way to better health sooner!

3 videos: How to collect feline blood

Choose your collection tubes wisely

You may never imagine that, when collecting blood from a cat the size of the collection tube would matter.  But it does.  Here’s why…

Here’s my feline friendly needle options

Every cat has blood.  (Yes! It’s true)  But every furry feline comes in different shapes and sizes, packets and colours so you need more than one type of needle for collecting blood.  Unfortunately, as I explain in the video above, suppliers can almost try and force you to use a particular size needle determined by the tube size they supply.  This forces you to collect more blood than is necessary, often from the jugular vein and the result can be very Feline UNfriendly!.

In this video I demonstrate the needle sizes I recommend and for what purpose…

How much is too much or too little?

In this video I explain how and why you need surprisingly little blood to conduct a feline glucose test. It’s less intrusive for the cat and less stress for you.  After you watch, you can also Read more on Blood Glucose as it relates to diabetes