Is it really necessary to have blood drawn every year?

This site may earn a commission from merchant affiliate links, including eBay, Amazon, and others.

dennishoddy

Sharpshooter
Supporting Member
Special Hen Supporter
Joined
Dec 9, 2008
Messages
84,556
Reaction score
61,836
Location
Ponca City Ok
Depends on lots of issues. I take a medication that could injure my liver so every time I go to the VA for an appointment, they draw blood. So far so good.
 

Fyrtwuck

Sharpshooter
Supporting Member
Special Hen Supporter
Joined
Jun 13, 2005
Messages
9,959
Reaction score
2,921
Location
Blanchard
Mine is drawn monthly. The drugs we are prescribed can be both helpful and harmful. If may help what ails you, but at the same time it could hurt something else in your body. It needs to be monitored and recorded. The docs can go back and look at the records and look for any changes and if need be, make changes before anything is damaged.
 

Hangfire

Sharpshooter
Supporting Member
Special Hen Supporter
Joined
Feb 2, 2013
Messages
3,040
Reaction score
9,465
Location
Norman
Supposedly because of the oral meds I'm on (blood pressure, diabetes and cholesterol) my doc has been checking my blood and urine every 90 days for the past few years.....so far so good.

I came down with hepatitis while in Vietnam and since I'd been seeing all the commercials on TV about hepatitis 'C' I ask the doc to have the lab check for that also last Dec......they didn't narrow down which I actually had (A, B, D or E) but I definitely don't have 'C' which was a relief.
 

CHenry

Sharpshooter
Special Hen
Joined
Feb 12, 2009
Messages
21,157
Reaction score
12,663
Location
Under your bed
Meh, blood draws are no big deal. I bet I had my arm stuck 200 times in 10 days while I was in Saints years ago. Almost could sleep through them except the person always wanted to talk to me.
 

amcardon

Sharpshooter
Supporting Member
Special Hen Supporter
Joined
Jan 2, 2013
Messages
1,448
Reaction score
1,052
Location
OKC
I understand annual labs, especially as we get older. Some of it might have to do with you having good insurance, but the ordering doc isn't going to see any income from the lab work, he might recognize you have good insurance so why not keep up with regular labs...

I don't order annual labs (or sometimes more frequent than that) unless there's something we're monitoring, but it's always nice when we're trying to diagnose and somebody is able to show recent lab work or a history of lab work that can show trends and subtle changes that might otherwise be missed.

Short answer, I don't see anything wrong with annual labs.
 

Latest posts

Top Bottom