Species: Equine

Specimen: Serum

Container: Plain (red top)

Collection protocol: Standard venepuncture

Special handling/shipping requirements: Standard

General information about the disease: N/A

General information about when this test is indicated:

Inhibin has been used to help confirm suspected ovarian granulosa cell tumours in the mare. These tumours are hormonally active and can produce inhibin, testosterone and progesterone. A non-pregnant mare with inhibin concentrations greater than 0.7 ng/mL, testosterone concentrations greater than 500-100 pg/mL and progesterone concentrations less than 1 ng/mL is very likely to have a GCT. Note that this assay has not been validated in the horse, and evaluation of this inhibin assay for diagnosis of GCT has not been performed.

Comparison with other related tests:

Testosterone assay is no longer recommended for diagnosis of mare GCT, as the assay cannot detect these relatively low levels of circulating testosterone.  Recently, serum Anti-Muellerian hormone (AMH) has been investigated for diagnosis of GCT, but this test has not been evaluated for that purpose at Awanui Veterinary.