a given patient. Reference Standards Ideally, reference standards for a test should be determined by testing a sizeable population (>60) of animals representative of the patient being tested. Accuracy may differ according to age of patient, species, sex, diet, weight, time of day, and activity status. For example, reference ranges for hemoglobin concentration are age- and sex-dependent As another example, an antigen-based heartworm test is the gold standard, antemortem diagnostic test for dogs; however, cats often have low worm burden, unisex worm infestations, or immature worm infestations that are not readily detected by these tests Thus, sensitivity is much lower in cats, and this test would not be appropriate as a gold standard for testing cats. Established reference ranges and interpretation of results are only valid for the methods and the laboratory described. Reference ranges generally represent the range of test results from a
(Levine et al. 1994; Martinaud et al. 1997) comparing the same muscles between animals and can cause the formation of intra- and/or and/or carcasses that have been handled dif- inter-protein disulfide cross-links (Stadtman ferently (Juncher et al. 2001). These differ- 1990; Martinaud et al. 1997). In general, both ences may arise because of differences in these changes reduce the functionality of pro- diet, breed, antemortem stress, postmortem teins in postmortem muscle (Xiong and handling of carcasses, etc. In fact, there have Decker 1995). In living muscle, the redox been reports of differences between animals state of muscle can influence carbohydrate and between muscles in the activity of some metabolism by directly affecting enzymes in enzymes involved in the oxidative defense the glycolytic pathway. Oxidizing agents can system of muscle (Daun et al. 2001).
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