The non-rabies blood tests — and who actually needs them

Last verified: 2026-08-25

The answer

Cats need no non-rabies blood tests. This page is about dogs.

Australia requires dogs to be tested for three things, and two of the three have an exemption worth knowing before you book anything:

So a desexed, leptospirosis-vaccinated dog needs one test. An entire, unvaccinated dog needs three — more appointments, more fees, and three more chances for a document to be wrong.

If your dog is not vaccinated against leptospirosis and your timeline allows, vaccinating on the manufacturer’s schedule can remove a test. Discuss it with your veterinarian at the start, not once the blood is drawn.

The Brucella trap

Only these test types are accepted, and the type used must be listed on the export health certificate:

• RSAT
• TAT
• IFAT

Only the standard versions. These are explicitly not approved:

• 2ME-RSAT
• 2ME-TAT
• AGID / AGID II
• Canine Brucella Multiplex Assay
• Brucella Slide Agglutination / AGID II combination test

This is the single most avoidable failure on this page. A laboratory running its normal canine brucellosis panel may well use a 2ME variant or the multiplex assay — they are perfectly good tests, and Australia does not accept them. Say the sample is for export to Australia when it is submitted, and check the report names an accepted test type before you build a timeline on it.

What every submission form and report must carry

For each test, the laboratory submission form must:

• record the dog’s microchip number correctly;
• state that the testing is for export;
• go to an approved laboratory.

Each laboratory report must show:

• the microchip number, correctly recorded;
• the blood sampling date;
• the test type;
• the result.

Remember what cannot be repaired: critical details on a laboratory report — including the microchip number — cannot be amended. A wrong number is a new test, not a correction.

Where the reports end up

In Great Britain, the Leishmania report, the Brucella report (if not desexed) and the Leptospira report (if not vaccinated) are attached to the export health certificate alongside the RNATT report and declaration. Whether an Official Veterinarian may sign and stamp them depends on whether the dog was fully prepared in the UK — see the British dog corridor.

What this page does not tell you

• Which laboratories are approved in your country.
• What a positive result means for any of the three — a veterinary and departmental question, and not one this site will guess at.
• Whether cats face any equivalent testing beyond the RNATT. Nothing in the sources read so far says they do.
• Costs, which vary by laboratory and country.