ABSTRACT
Anemia is a common disorder in domestic pet animals, usually encountered in veterinary clinics. The objective of this study was to evaluate the hematological and serum biochemical parameters of the anemic dogs and to show practically the value of measuring the corrected reticulocyte percentage [CRP]. A survey was conducted on 500 dogs which referred to small animal hospital of the faculty of veterinary medicine of Tehran university. From this population, a group of 139 anemic dogs was selected with PCV less than 37% and 20 healthy dogs as control group. They were examined for the hematological parameters [RBC, Hb, PCV, MCV, MCHC, RDW, WBC, PLT, Dif, reticulocyte percentage and corrected reticulocyte percentage] and serum biochemical factors [Fe, alanine amino transferase activity,creatinine, total protein and glucose]. The anemic dogs were divided into 3 anemic groups based on MCV and MCHC: microcytic hypochromic [1.44%], microcytic normochromic [21.59%] and normocytic normochromic [76.97%]. A comparison survey was conducted between the results of the 3 anemic and control groups by one way ANOVA and Tukey test. The measurement of hematological parameters indicated that RBC, Hb and PCV decreased significantly in all anemic dogs. The results showed that RDW of microcytic hypochromic group increased significantly compared to control. The reticulocyte percentage of all anemic groups was significantly different from control group, but calculation of CRP showed there was only significant difference between normocytic-normochromic and control groups. One way ANOVA indicated that serum Fe in microcytic-hypochromic group and serum creatinine in normocytic-normochromic group significantly decreased and increased, respectively. Total protein of all groups is significantly decreased compared to control group. There were no significant changes for the other parameters. Based on the result, it is suggested that CRP and biochemical parameters be measured such as: creatinine, total protein, ALT and glucose in addition to CBC, in all anemic dogs