Diabetes mellitus in dogs: a study of the critical difference for canine serum fructosamine

The purpose of this study was to calculate the critical difference between two analytical measurements of serum fructosamine concentration in dogs. The critical difference can be used to judge whether the difference between two consecutive analytical results from the same animal is due to natural variation. Blood samples from 15 apparently clinically healthy beagle dogs were collected once a week for six consecutive weeks. The serum fructosamine concentration was measured by the reduction test with nitroblue tetrazolium and the critical difference was calculated from the component of variance for weeks within dogs (sigma2s) and the residual variance (sigma2e). The critical difference between two consecutive analytical results was 33.5 micromol/litre.