I did the blue horizon test today. Finger prick test. It's the 6 plus test. I had a small bottle with a yellow rubber seal. I had a hard time getting blood, my husband said it was like getting blood out of a stone haha. I managed to fill the just over half way. The instructions said to fill it as far as possible. Will it be enough do you think?
I took the test at 7.30am. I'd not eaten since 8pm last night but I had a camomile tea about 10.30pm and just water in the morning. Hopefully that's ok.
Now just a waiting game. They should receive my sample in the morning. I am hoping I get the results soon. Do they email them?
Jingyd35, BH will contact you if there is insufficient blood for any of the tests. Results will be emailed to you. Turnaround after receiving samples is usually fast.
All being well you ought to get the results in your inbox in two to three days.
If you have to do it again, do it when you are warm, have a drink of water before hand too. I find that helps plus putting on the little elastic band and holding the lancet tight against my finger.
I've also found that doing it on the side of your finger rather than on the pad - I find my little finger and ring finger best. Just don't do it too close to your nail or it can run under your nail rather than into the tube which is annoying and in my case was kind of messy
Did you stick your hand in warm water to dilate blood vessels and keep the hand below chest height whilst encouraging blood flow? I found these tips very helpful. Hope you have enough blood
Yes hand was nice and warm and I kept hand pointing downwards at side of me whilst hubby massaged the finger. We got just over half full so fingers crossed. It took 2 finger pricks lol.
I couldn't bleed at all, despite using every trick in the book and more, and ended up having to order an alternate kit to take to a phlebotomist. BH were very helpful, and speedy in turn-around time.
same here Agastache my fingers were black and blue and about 3mm of blood to show for it! i got my blood drawn locally for £29.00 with the alternate kit, i wont try my fingers again lol
Hi Jing, don't worry I am sure they will have enough blood. I had a Blue Horizon one recently too. My results came back very quickly, they emailed them to me. I sent them back first class recorded because I didn't want to risk them being lost. They received them next day and I had my results back the following day.
I found I got more blood out of my middle finger rather than the index one
It took me two lancets and a kitchen knife to get 3/4 drops for a vit D test, so i always take the hospital options. (Yes, I ended up slicing myself with a kitchen knife, but it worked).
Probably years of (bad) fiddle playing, wreath making and saddlery have given me very tough fingers and super-fast clotting.
I had the same problem when I did the thyroid ten test. I didn't manage to fill to vial much above halfway. There was enough to do nine of the tests leaving off TSH (obviously that see it is not as important as the others)
Yes, I bought their thyroid ten kit last year mainly because the NHS lab don't test for ft4 and ft3. I was a bit worried that I didn't have enough blood in the vial but they managed all but one of the tests. It helped to get my diagnosis of pernicious anaemia alongside my hashimotos. To be honest the kit could do with a couple of extra finger pickers as two don't seem to be quite enough.
I see you've had a message from Paul at BH. He was very helpful to me when I was looking at what test to go for. I hope they manage to do it for you OK.
my gp's nurse was happy to give me extra prickers, one was for the warfarin people and is huge it didnt help i just cant get blood out my fingers and clot too quickly.
I have the same problem with the finger prick kits sometimes, they can be very tricky. If your blood takes too long to extract it can start to haemolyse (clot) before you have a chance to invert the tube and mix the anti coagulation.
Half a tube may not be enough, but if you message me your name I'll get the lab to keep an eye out and let us know if they need to make a difficult decision. ☺
The first few BH tests I did I ended up with sore fingers and was trying to extract blood for ages and this time was dreading it. However I think I have cracked it:
1. I had a bath before hand as was washing my hair anyway and thought it would help to warm me up. It worked!! I filled the vial up in about 15 secs as it was just dripping out of finger this time and had to get the plaster on quick to stop it (yuk)!
2. last time it did the test it also helped to walked up and down stairs a couple of times.
I did test on Monday this week posted in afternoon and had results Wed am in inbox.
Only shame is I called BH to try to get Vit d on same blood sample and they said it was a different sample I needed. But at least I know how to get it over and done with this time.
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it didnt help i just cant get blood out my fingers and clot too quickly.
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