From:
sindahise@yahoo.com
Date: 2005-05-17 17:14:47 UTC
Subject: RE: Emergency - Anemia!!!!!! (Life threatening)
To: ferrethealth@smartgroups.com
Message-ID: <3680411.1116350087355.JavaMail.root@thallium.smartgroups.com>
Author wrote:
> A hematocrit of 1 is not compatible with life, but I'm a bit confused. How do they get a hematocrit level from a blood smear? You have to centrifuge enough blood so you can figure the packed cell volume vs plasma. Maybe it was a red blood cell count?
Sorry, was just quoting what the vet told me. And yes, it very well could have been the RBC and she might well have simply not given me the right name or mispoken herself. Either way it wasn't compatible with life. She did the test in her office in a "blink" (ie very quickly) and truthfully I don't know what it was at this point other than she did it quickly.
I'm quoting the vet in this case and often working with information that I, like you, find myself wondering about on retrospect.