Bleeding

[Dragonwalker]

I’ve been injecting eight weekly for just over a year - in between eight weekly injections from the GP. I’ve never hurt myself or bruised. Last week I injected with no pain but when I pulled the needle out I had quite a blood flow, about a tablespoonful. It stopped very quickly- about 3 or 4 seconds but scared me a bit. It wasn’t veinous blood - it was bright red. In fact I wondered if any of the serum had leaked out with it. Or all of it. I feel a bit rubbish. I put it in nice and slowly but maybe pulled the needle out too fast. Would that cause the problem?

[pvanderaa]

You very likely hit a blood vessel.

Are you taking blood thinners or aspirin for your heart? These reduce coagulation so the fact to stopped quickly I’m thinking you don’t.

You may end up with a bruise under the skin as well. These are harmless.

The stress and worry are probably using up more B12 than you lost from any blood leakage.

If the B12 gets into a blood vessel you may have a stronger reaction and feel worse as the B12 is used up faster and flushed out by liver and kidney.

[Dragonwalker in reply to pvanderaa]

The blood was bright cherry red, not the dark blue-it blood of a vein. Which is why I queried if I’d lost any serum. Small bruise, doesn’t hurt. Stress caused largely by mopping up the blood! It wasn’t spurting but running off my leg onto the floor as I was dealing with the used needle and syringe.

[Gambit62 Administrator]

it sounds like you hit a vein - the blood would be a deep red. Generally the flow is very small if you hit a vein but I've had one occasion on which the amount was similiar to what you are describing.

It is unlikely that the speed with which you put the needle in or took it out would have any impact on what happened - just that you probably caught the vein full on.