The coagulation factors are part of normal hemostasis, and both hereditary and acquired coagulopathies that involve this system have an important role in veterinary medicine, generally evidenced by clinical signs such as: petechias, ecchymosis, hematomas and late hemorrhagies. The objective of this experiment was to determine reference range values of prothrombin time (PT) and activated partial thromboplastin time (aPTT), for manual methods. Human commercial kits were used because there are no available veterinary kits for this purpose. Forty healthy dogs, with no definite breed, male or female, with variable age were used. The blood samples were 2.5ml, harvested by cephalic venipuncture, and stored in tubes containing 0.25ml of sodium citrate 3.8%. Total blood was centrifuged and plasma separated. PT and aPTT were determinate using commercial kits, "HemoStat Thromboplastin-SIª" and "HemoStat aPTT-El b", respectively. The results ranged from 6.87 ± 1.4 seconds for PT, with a minimum and a maximum of 4.07 and 9.67, respectively, and 15.1 ± 1.6 seconds for aPTT, with a minimum and a maximum of 11.9 and 18.3, respectively. As a conclusion, these results can be used as reference values. These human commercial kits can be used for determination in dogs.
hemostasis; clinical pathology; coagulation time
