Sarah L Rhoades, DVM
Providing quality veterinary services for horses in the greater Franklin County, Missouri area.
Stall-Side SAA
Testing
What is SAA?
SAA stands for Serum Amyloid A - it's a protein found in the blood. In a normal, horse this protein is actually exceedingly low, but when a horse begins to mount an inflammatory response, say to an infection, the concentration level of this protein rises very rapidly, within hours, sometimes even before a fever or additional clinical signs develops.
Why is SAA so important?
Because SAA levels rise and decline so rapidly, and because the test can be performed quickly, and easily, on the farm it makes this test invaluable for:
​
-
Differentiating the cause of vague symptoms (whether it's caused by an infection or a colic for example).
-
Monitoring the severity of the horse's immune response
-
Monitoring the effect of treatment
-
Determining the end of an infectious disease process
-
Controlling a contagious disease outbreak
-
When used with in compliment with a physical signs and other diagnostic blood tests (Complete Blood Cell Count, Serum Chemistry, and Serum Fibrinogen), you can determine the stage of an infectious process and take pro-active treatment measures based off of this.
_JPG.jpg)
