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

Updated On September 23rd, 2025

Pet's info: Dog | Mixed Breed | Female | spayed | 1 year and 4 months old | 10.6 lbs

Snowball recently had a comprehensive exam with her rabies vaccine update. According to her results everything looks pretty normal except it says that Hematocrit (HCT) is above normal and MCHC is below normal. Can anyone explain what these are and if I need to be doing something? We have Banfield as her primary vet and they don’t really explain things they just vaccinate her & test for worms unless we have an issue. I’ve added a photo of a portion of the results as well.

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1 Answer

Most Helpful Answer

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Answered By Destini R. Holloway, DVM

Veterinarian

Published on June 18th, 2018

I can understand your concern when seeing abnormal blood findings for your pet. But no worries these are considered to be insignificant findings in and of themselves. You don't need to do any treatment for your pet whatsoever. The slightly elevated HCT means that your pet was had hemoconcentration, which means mildly concentrated red blood cells. Nothing significant. And the MCHC is a measure of how much hemoglobin your pets red blood cells are carrying. A mild decrease in this is also insignificant. I hope this helps and best wishes moving forward with your pet Snowball! Take care.

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