I love it when I get to treat a DKA patient. This is a condition that is easy to diagnose, and even though it is acutely life threatening, if we manage these patients correctly, the prognosis for discharge is good. The response of our treatment is rapidly visible: correction of severe hypovolaemia, acid-base and electrolyte abnormalities make these patients feel better within hours. This webinar will use case-based teaching with a focus on the diagnosis and treatment of DKA. Pathophysiology will also be discussed as an understanding the pathophysiology goes a long way to increasing our understanding of how to manage these patients. As not all of you are lucky enough to have 24-hour facilities, protocols for both 24-hour facilities and limits-hour practices will be discussed. By the end of this seminar you will feel confident in your diagnosis and management decisions for these very complex but very rewarding patients.

A dog presents to you limping. You take an x-ray and discover an aggressive bone lesion. You suspect a primary bone tumour. What are the differential diagnoses? What next? As a vet, you will encounter a dog with an aggressive appendicular bone lesion on x-rays. Most dogs will have osteosarcoma, but other types of cancers, benign lesions and infection are possible.

There are ever increasing numbers/proportions of samples that are being sent to external pathology laboratories requesting non-interpreted profiles. The generated results must then be interpreted (and acted upon) by the veterinary clinician and consequently, clinicians MUST have a thorough understanding of both how ‘abnormal’ results can occur, whilst simultaneously assessing the relevance of both normal and abnormal test results. It is important to maintain a reasonable level of scepticism about any laboratory results that do not fit with the patient and clinical picture: Do not just believe all the numbers. Unexpected results are not uncommon and may necessitate clinical re-evaluation. Alternatively, unexpected results may be erroneous or misleading. Trends over several serial samples may be more informative than single results. Every test result needs to be evaluated carefully. Negative and positive predictive values should be considered for each result and clinical setting.