5StrandsPet Food & Environmental Intolerance Test, at Home Sensitivity Test for Dogs & Cats, 412 Items Tested, Pet Health Check, Fast 5 Day Results, For All Ages and Breeds

I spent a lot of time determining if I wanted to spend the money on this kit. I knew if it was accurate, the results would be well worth it. But I’ve also read the reviews that claimed they never got results, got incorrect results, or got bad customer service. After receiving the results, I couldn’t be happier that I got this comprehensive test!I’ve done a lot of researching about dog allergies. I’ve read that DNA tests aren’t accurate. My vet told me the only way to get real results was to go to the expensive specialist for expensive tests. Then I read that even blood tests weren’t always accurate. Diet testing takes a long time! I ended up ordering this test because I was so sick of not getting results with what we were doing.Here’s our story:Roo was licking her belly quite a bit, giving herself rashes. She’d occasionally lick her feet, and occasionally her armpits. We didn’t think much of it. Then it got to the point where she started licking her belly and armpits until she was completely red and raw. She increased her feet licking too. Then she also started scratching aggressively at her chin, opening her skin with her claws. It got to the point of lots of hotspots and skin infections. Googled it- sounds like allergies or intolerances. So we made changes to her diet, but not enough. We didn’t think it’d be from food she’s been eating for a long time, so we didn’t take away everything. So anyhow, we changed her kibble- gave her sensitive stomach and skin salmon. I had also been giving her a glucosamine chondroitin supplement since I had some left over from another pet, which I stopped at the same time we changed kibble. After a few weeks, we saw a lot of improvement, but she still showed symptoms. Maybe it wasn’t the dog food… We give our dogs dogurt (a frozen yogurt recipe). Maybe that’s it…. We stopped it and less than a week later, she got better, but still has some issues. Ok. Things are much better- but at this point we don’t know what to change. Only choices left were do nothing more and let her be slightly uncomfortable and deal with the occasional rashes and hotspots, send off an allergy test, or go to the expensive vet. All of these things may not have provided the desired results, so we picked the allergy test.I received it the next day and registered my kit. The whole process was so easy! I cleaned the dog brush so there wasn’t a hair on it from another pet and got a good size sample to put in the bag. Sealed it up, folded the box back up, put it in the mailing bag, and put the shipping label that was provided on the package. Kept the tracking number. I knew what day it was supposed to arrive, I couldn’t wait to get results. I tracked it the day it was supposed to arrive around noon, it said it had been picked up. By later that afternoon, I got a notification that the sample was received. It was a Friday, so I had assumed the weekend wouldn’t count in the 4 days. I was hoping for results by the following Thursday. Monday before noon I received an email that the results were in-after 3 days!And guess what was on there… Chicken, her original kibble had chicken in it. Chicken is also common in so many treats too. Glucosamine and chondroitin were also both on there. That would make sense for why we saw a sudden increase right before she got really bad symptoms. And why she had significant results by changing her food and stopping the glucosamine. Yogurt was on there… we saw improvement after stopping her yogurt. There were a lot of medium things she was allergic to that was in supplements we were giving, like brewers dried yeast and probiotics. Now that we’ve received results we can finally narrow down what food, supplements, and treats she can have. She’s so much healthier and there’s still more room for improvement! She looks happier and even 5 years younger! This test has been a game changer for us!Overall, I wasn’t a fan of how the results were listed. It’s grouped by severity of both food and environmental. For example, chicken meal was insignificant, chicken heart was mild, and chicken protein was severe. It made me have to search through the papers multiple times for multiple things. It would have been much easier if all chicken allergies were listed together, or if there was an option to filter alphabetically instead of by severity.Overall, this test was well worth it and my dog is doing so much better!

Why did you pick this product vs others?:Recommended by a friend who has used it for her dogs with good results. There were numerous reviews from people who did not understand the differences between intolerances and allergies. Being quite familiar with both and working with food issues in our rescue dog, the testing is actually accurate.

As a white pitbull mom I need all the help finding what my dog is allergic to! I’ve heard great things about this company through an allergy group for dogs. Results come super quick and you get to see what is making your dog itchy and have gross digestive issues. We have tried it all, apoquel, cytopoint, immunotherapy, everything. He still is itchy and pink. So excited to continue eliminating the things that test shows as allergic or sensitive. It does take a few weeks for it to start helping but so amazing!! Highly recommend!

UPDATE:Turkey came back as no reaction, green coded and totally safe. So we switched her food to Turkey. Turns out she's allergic. These tests feel very randomly generated, and flat out risky and unsafe for pet well being.---Original Review---We ordered this test after our doctor confirmed a severe chicken allergy in our dog and switched her to a lamb-based diet, which quite literally saved her life.Without knowing it, feeding chicken-based foods led to an 18-month allergy flare that left my 2-year-old dog with permanent skin lesions and was threatening to make her go deaf from constant ear infections. She literally smelled like she was dying, and we were talking palliative care with our vet, who suggested an elimination diet as a last ditch attempt to figure out our dog's allergy. When we did the elimination diet and moved her to a lamb based diet, EVERY SINGLE physical symptom cleared up in about 72 hours of being off chicken.We ordered this test because we wanted to scan for a suspected salmon intolerance and anything else we might have missed during her elimination diet. So we went in aware of a severe chicken allergy/intolerance, and knowing that lamb was safe.So imagine our surprise to get our results where lamb flags as a worst of the worst intolerance - even more than the chicken that was killing her. If we were to put faith in these test results and didn't have the advanced knowledge going into the testing, we well may have taken her off the lamb food that has saved her life and moved her back to the chicken-based food that was killing her.Our test results are also unlikely to be true based on statistical probabilities. Our kit returned58 level 3 intolerances64 level 2 intolerances67 level one intolerancesThat leaves 191 things that she didn't respond to. That means she had some form of intolerance to almost exactly 50% of things they tested for.This split would not be realistic as a natural occurrence. We should expect to see significantly more non-issue and level one intolerance than level 2 and 3 intolerances. This adds to the distrust of the results.Upon closer review of the flagged allergies and their severities on our report, we noticed that anything actually in her diet flagged as intolerant on some level. The ONLY things on this test that didn't flag were food items that just don't exist in her diet at all. I suspect that this test only tests for food IN THE DOG'S SYSTEM as opposed to foods that will actually harm them.This makes sense, since Lamb would be the #1 thing in her diet, and it flagged as a level 3 "discontinue immediately" intolerance...when in reality it's a safe food for her. Chicken flagged as a level 2 intolerance, which makes sense since she's now been without it for nearly 8 weeks, with the exception of small amounts of chicken fat and by-product meal in her treats, but does have a SEVERE issue with chicken. So SOMETHING was in there, just not much, and it flagged as a lower intolerance than it should have.I understand that the test doesn't bill itself as 100% accurate, but this test could have actually led to harm to our pet and that is scary.Buy this for fun if you like, but please don't use this as a substitute for the spendy vet testing. Please don't make feeding and medication decisions based on this test. We feel like we wasted $150 on this test that could have been better allocated towards more advanced testing that is scientific and would have offered us true insight to our dog's unique needs. This test feels generic in nature and like it probably doesn't have anything to do with our dog at all.The pros are that it is simple to do, fast, and causes the dog no discomfort.

5Strands ROCKS! Every step was easy and streamlined. Received my dog’s test results sooner than I thought I would. Was surprised at some of the results and so thankful I was able to removed them from my dog’s environment and food. There were a few questions I had with the test results concerning what items were INSIGNIFICANT and what were SEVERE INTOLERANCES. My concerns were explained to me and relieved my questions perfectly. Stacy was such a help and didn’t rush me. I will be doing more tests with 5Strands when my new dog arrives. So glad I did this testing.