Diagnostic techniques and sample collection.

With the advancing knowledge of medicine, diagnostic techniques and laboratory equipment, practicing veterinary surgeons are increasingly capable of processing many of their patients' blood, urine, and tissue samples on-site. No case is better suited to this scenario than the dermatology case, which enjoys a unique privilege in the clinic because the clinician is frequently able to harvest, process, and analyze pathologic samples from affected animals during or shortly after the consultation, eliminating the need to wait for results from external laboratories and consequently reducing the time to recovery. Good sampling techniques are crucial for the acquisition of optimal data however, and this article highlights the key points of these procedures and recommends when they are best employed.