Vaccicheck Titre Testing

What is Titre Testing?

Vaccicheck is a brand of Antibody Titre Test used for Dogs tand Cats to test antibody levels to the 3 core Diseases in the UK and elsewhere:
Distemper, Hepatitis and Parvovirus (DHP) there are other test available recently.

In practice what we do at our Vaccicheck clinics is take a small blood sample from your pet and then run a semi-qualitative test to measure antibody levels in her blood to DHP.

Put simply if they have antibodies to any one of the diseases you do not need to vaccinate for that disease. It shows the animal's immune system has responded to either natural infection or more likely vaccination at an earlier date and it is protected.

This means you do not need to repeat vaccinate so reducing the small risk of vaccine reactions even further
.
As these are very affective "live virus vaccines" they do work well and most dogs we do have antibodies to all three disease.

They gradually fade with age in most cases but if you what the video below Prof Ford explains that it is probably a life long cell mediated immunity but we cannot 100% confirm this

When should I have an antibody test?

While most pet guardians tend to think about having a titre test when they get the reminder from their vet in fact the ideal time is 2-4 weeks after the vaccine in particular the puppy vaccinations at 2-3 months of age i.e. at 14-16 weeks.

It recently has been shown that there are a small but significant number of dogs for whom the vaccine does not work especially when given before 12 weeks of age. This is a particular problem for Rotties and Doberman breeds it seems but not exclusively. You can read more about this on my blog page

So as long as it is more than 2 weeks after a vaccine has been given ant time is good.

How much does it Cost?

The price will vary from one vet to another, we tend to do a large number, when 12-24 at once and can keep the cost down to £30-£35. If you can come to a clinic please you. Dates will be on the Blog page or my Facebook page.

We email the results to you within 48 hours as a rule along with a recommendation to re-test or re-vaccinate as appropriate. See example below

Why is Vaccicheck Important?

Vaccicheck is a reliable method of determining whether or NOT your dog needs an annual vaccination for the 3 core diseases above.
Over vaccination can cause serious damage to a dog's health and should therefore be avoided. 
Vaccicheck takes the worry out of wondering if your animal is adequately protected and prevents the need for guesswork.

VACCINES ARE NOT RISK FREE
The more of them you subject your dog to, the greater the chance he will experience a vaccine reaction, some of which are so catastrophic they can affect the animal for the rest of its life.

OVER VACCINATING AN ANIMAL DOES NOT PROVIDE GREATER PROTECTION TO CORE DISEASES.