An Accurate Blood Report or Food Report?

Life as we know exists due to one major aspect that is very much vital for each and every one of us. Blood is one of those substances that connect each and every organ of our body. This is the reason why anything at all in the blood will affect our whole body and disrupt our entire living mechanism.

Keeping this fact in mind; it is necessary that we all have our blood tested once in a while. Our changing lifestyle and daily food habits have knowingly or un-knowingly opened doors for a lot of unwanted substances into our precious blood. And there exists many types of danger that one cannot be completely aware about in their whole life-time.

Now since you have decided to get your blood tested, let us understand how one must prepare themselves for a Blood Test. For starters, there exist many kinds of blood tests. This would depend on the reason why one does a blood test. For e.g. After you read this article, a sudden realization that you are not aware about the details of your blood, so you go in for a General Blood Test. Such General Blood Tests usually requires a person to Fast for a certain period prior to the test.

Now you may wonder why? Or how is that going to make a difference?

As mentioned in the earlier paragraph, our food habits have huge contribution to the blood. Every solid or liquid that we consume goes partly to our blood, now that can include the very juice, soft drink, milk, etc. you just had. The measurement of blood sugar (glucose) and some blood lipids (fats and cholesterol) are common examples.

Let’s imagine a situation wherein you just had some form of meat for the first time ever in your life, that is rich in fat and that contributes to the cholesterol level in your body. You immediately go for a blood test and what’s the result?...your blood report will show that you maybe dieing of cholesterol and may have to be admitted and treated immediately or Doctors may state that you are prone to heart diseases, when in reality it was the meat that you just had over the delicious lunch at you friends place.

 Surprised?? Well, there have been many cases where some doctors and various Laboratories do not give much importance to emphasizing the necessity of fasting before a blood test only because they would presume that you might be aware about the same.

Generally food requires a minimum amount of time to get settled and dissolved into our body and blood and show a case or normalcy in our entire system. The constituents of the food or drink you last consumed would stay strongest and reveal unnecessarily.

A blood test is done to understand how your blood is doing on a normal day and for that your entire system needs to settle down at a normal state which is why you need to Fast or in simple terms not eat or drink anything (apart water in some cases), till your blood is withdrawn, for a particular period that should and would be mentioned by your doctor.

• When you fast, you refrain from eating or drinking anything (except water) for a good period of 8-10 hours generally and otherwise specified by your doctor.

• You are allowed to take your medications unless interrupted by your doctor.

• Nothing else is permissible during this period (no coffee, no smoking, and no alcohol, not even chewing gums because even the slightest juices can bring about variations in the blood).

• Try and rest before you blood test.

• Once your blood is withdrawn you can immediately consume some juices and have some snack as per your preference.

• It is advisable to schedule your blood test for early morning, so that the hours your go without food can be used up by your Good Night Sleep.

• Always remember, Fasting is usually considered for an accurate blood report and for further treatments. If in doubt, feel free to ask your doctor regarding anything.

Rapid Urine Test Evaluated for Helicobacter Pylori Infection

A rapid urine test based on enzyme-linked immunosorbent assay (ELISA) has been developed for the detection of anti-Helicobacter Pylori antibodies in urine.

Several methods to diagnose H. pylori infection have been developed, among which the urea breath test (UBT) is currently regarded as the most accurate assay, but the UBT is still expensive and not widely available in many countries.

Scientists at the Ho Chi Minh City Medicine and Pharmacy University (Vietnam) working with Japanese colleagues, enrolled 200 patients undergoing upper gastrointestinal endoscopy from October 2012 to December 2012. Three biopsies were taken from each patient: two for histologic examination and one for the rapid urease test (RUT).

The biopsy for RUT was taken from the greater curvature of the corpus, about 2 cm above the atrophic border. This biopsy location has been reported to optimize the sensitivity of the PyloriTek RUT to detect H. pylori (Serim Research Co.; Elkhart, IN, USA). Urine samples were collected and were processed within one hour of collection for the detection of antibodies against H. pylori using the Rapirun Helicobacter pylori Antibody Stick (Otsuka Pharmaceutical Co., Ltd.; Tokyo, Japan). The test measures human immunoglobulin G (IgG) antibodies against H. pylori in urine using the principle of immunochromatography.

Of the 200 patients, 111 (55.5%) were diagnosed as being H. pylori positive. The sensitivity, specificity, and accuracy of the Rapirun Stick test were 84.7%, 89.9%, and 87.0%, respectively. There were 17 (8.5%) false-negative patients and 9 (4.5%) false-positive patients. Of the 24 patients with gastro-duodenal ulcer, 22 (91.7%) had H. pylori infection. However, 7 of 22 (31.8%) patients with reflux esophagitis also had the infection.

The authors demonstrated the usefulness of the Rapirun Stick test for the diagnosis of H. pylori infection in a Vietnamese population and the sensitivity, specificity, and accuracy of the Rapirun Stick test were high. In several patients, RUT and histologic examination produced false-negative or false-positive results, leading to the possible misdiagnosis of H. pylori infection. The study was published on May 7, 2014, in the World Journal of Gastroenterology.

(Credit:

 

Lab Medica)

MERS-CoV Immunity Not Widespread

A study has found no significant rates of antibodies against Middle East respiratory syndrome coronavirus (MERS-CoV) in one Middle East-North Africa (MENA) region, suggesting that the virus has not been circulating in humans for long, and that the majority of the population remains susceptible to infection. The results of the study by Aburizaiza et al., was published in the January 2014 issue of the Journal of Infectious Diseases, (Vol. 20 (2)).

The study involved 130 blood donors and 226 slaughterhouse workers from Jeddah and Makkah (Saudi Arabia) sampled during 2012. Serum samples were analyzed using the recommended staged serological approach: screening of IgG and IgM antibodies by conventional IFA based on MERS-CoV-infected and non-infected cells (EUROIMMUN AG; Lübeck, Germany), followed up by confirmation by discriminative recombinant IFA based on viral spike proteins and plaque-reduction neutralization assay. Only eight sera were positive in the screening test, and these reactions were subsequently resolved to be specific for established coronaviruses. These results highlight the importance of multistage serological testing. Nevertheless, the level of cross reactivity with other human coronaviruses in the screening test is relatively low. Significantly, these results demonstrate an absence of population immunity in the region and at the sampling timepoint.

MERS-CoV is an emerging pathogen which is responsible for an outbreak of severe acute respiratory illness predominantly in the Arabian Peninsula with a high number of fatalities. From September 2012 to March 2014, there have been 206 laboratory-confirmed cases with 86 deaths. The transmission mechanisms of the virus remain unknown, and animal reservoirs are suspected to play a role. In a further serological study, antibodies against MERS-CoV were detected in a majority of dromedary camels sampled in the United Arab Emirates in 2003 and 2013 (Meyer et al., Emerging Infectious Diseases, Vol. 20 (4), April 2014). The high antibody prevalence suggests a potential role for camelids in the emergence and spread of the virus in humans. 

(Credits: Lab Medica)

When to worry about blood test results? Abnormal readings aren’t always a problem !

Blood tests are an indispensable tool of medicine. They’re used to screen, diagnose, confirm, and monitor diseases. There are many hundreds of them, and each one is subject not only to observation but also to interpretation.

There is no such thing as a perfect lab test, but all tests done by accredited labs today use methods that have been scrutinized and approved by National Accreditation Board for Testing and Calibration Laboratories (NABL). And the government certifies and inspects these labs regularly to make sure they’re keeping up standards.

Those “reference ranges” you see on the reports may vary slightly from lab to lab, depending on which of several possible methods a lab chooses to use. Test results can also fall outside the reference range for reasons that have nothing to do with disease or medications.

One common example: ­Patients who follow the usual instruction to have “nothing to eat or drink the night before” can end up with high blood urea nitrogen, which assesses kidney function. Their kidneys are fine, but they’ve dehydrated themselves enough to cause an elevated reading. That’s why we tell our patients to have “nothing to eat or drink from dinner the night before—except for liberal amounts of water.” As a bonus, adequate hydration makes it easier to draw blood by plumping up the veins.

And triglycerides and blood glucose levels, included in many routine blood tests, are very sensitive to the time of the last meal and reach the “fasting” baseline only after 8 to 12 hours without eating. So patients who had that late-night snack and have their blood drawn early the next morning might have out-of-range ­results.

Other abnormal readings may or may not indicate a problem. A high lev­el of creatine phosphokinase, a muscle enzyme, can signal a heart or muscular ailment—or it can mean you worked out shortly before your blood was drawn.

And if you’re an adolescent or recovering from a broken bone, a high level of alkaline phosphatase, a bone (and liver) enzyme, is completely expected; but if you’re not, it could be an ominous sign of liver disease or certain cancers.

So even if you exercise your option to receive your results directly from the lab, you should still get your doctor to weigh in and not try to decode the data yourself.

Maintaining steady blood sugar reduces those extra pounds

Maintaining stable blood sugar levels has big implications for good health. Blood sugar alterations can cause mood swings, energy dips, fatigue, irritability, headaches, cravings for carbohydrates or coffee, lightheadedness, a shaky feeling if you skip a meal or the feeling that you need a nap after eating.

If you suffer from any of these symptoms, you might want to think about blood sugar and how much better you can feel when you avoid the highs and lows.

The fix for all of these symptoms is blood sugar regulation. Many hormones come into play, such as insulin. After eating a meal containing carbohydrate, our bodies break the this down into simple sugars that are then carried in the bloodstream. The pancreas responds by secreting insulin. Insulin's job is to travel through the bloodstream seeking sugar and transport it into cells for storage in the form of glucose. Glucose levels in the blood then come back down to the proper level.

When blood glucose is chronically high, damage can occur to the liver, pancreas, kidney, blood vessels, brain and nerves. Keeping blood sugars at a reasonable level is important for overall health.

The body's first choice when it goes to store sugar is to put it in the liver and the muscles. The problem arises when these storage sites become full. The body then needs to find another place to put it, storing sugar in the form of triglycerides. Some of the triglycerides remain in the blood, and some get stored as body fat.

The body uses carbohydrates for fuel first. If you eat a steady supply of food rich in carbohydrate, they are readily available to the body, and it doesn't have to take this out of storage when it needs some energy. You never get to tap into the fuel supply stored in the fat cells, so it remains on your body as fat.

Your body is not receiving adequate nutrition from a high-carbohydrate diet, so your body sends you a message to keep eating. What it really needs is the nutrition stored in vegetables and protein sources like meat, dairy and eggs. But if you keep feeding your body with carbohydrate when you feel hungry, you keep experiencing the energy peaks and valleys and lose an opportunity for better nutrition from foods that have more to offer. Also, you can't lose weight until you force your body into fat-burning mode by shifting to a diet that isn't so reliant on carbohydrates.

Should Mark Zuckerberg allow blood donation status on Facebook?

Facebook has emerged not just as a social media tool but something that makes our world go around. It has the potential to change the world with over 1.28 billion active users and that’s why SocialBlood.org is asking Facebook to add blood donation status on people’s profile pages. There is almost always a shortage of blood in both developing and developed countries. This is a fact and the situation has been this way for quite some time despite so many people willing to donate blood.

A petition has been started by SocialBlood.org, an Indian company which uses Facebook to help people fight blood donors. SocialBlood.org was started by 24-year-old Karthik Naralasetty after he was moved by the plight of a four-year-old girl who was suffering from thalassemia. He had told us earlier in an exclusive interview: ‘SocialBlood plugs into the Facebook for the obvious reasons of having everyone in one place. On syncing with the service, the user adds information like the city they are available in, geofence (for notifications for blood request), blood type and if they can donate blood. Then it pulls up list of connections that are already using the service. The interface is fairly simple to use, the filters on the top bar help to narrow down on blood request and donors available for a particular blood type. The map pulls up that information with markings on the location and a legend is available for the assistance of first time users.

The beauty of a social platform like this is the fact that, it helps democratize and populate the system with the known network. We can scan the network for blood relations (known people with the same blood type as ours) and invite members which can be extremely useful during the time of distress. The user can also make a blood request using a quick form asking critical questions. The user adds information like what component (red blood cells, plasma or whole blood) along with type is required and adding other details like the number of units required, the date of requirement and hospital name.

Many people require blood from accident victims to people suffering from rare blood disorders. It’s important to ensure that these people get blood that is free from HIV, hepatitis viruses and other infections which can be transmitted through unsafe transfusion. In high-income countries, transfusion is most commonly used to support advanced medical treatment and complex surgeries like open-heart surgery and advance trauma care. In low- and middle-income countries it is used often for management of pregnancy-related complications, childhood malaria complicated by severe anemia and trauma-related injuries.

Depression is detectable in the blood!

Researchers at the MedUni Vienna have demonstrated the possibility of using a blood test to detect depression. While blood tests for mental illnesses have until recently been regarded as impossible, a recent study clearly indicates that, in principle, depression can in fact be diagnosed in this way and this could become reality in the not too distant future.

Serotonin transporter (SERT) is a protein in the cell membrane that facilitates the transport of the neurotransmitter serotonin (popularly known as the "happiness hormone") into the cell. In the brain, serotonin transporter regulates neural depression networks. Depressive conditions can frequently be caused by a lack of serotonin. As a result, the serotonin transporter is also the point of action for the major antidepressant drugs.

The serotonin transporter, however, also occurs in large quantities in numerous other organs such as the intestines or blood. Recent studies have shown that the serotonin transporter in the blood works in exactly the same way as in the brain. In the blood, it ensures that blood platelets maintain the appropriate concentration of serotonin in the blood plasma.

Researchers at the MedUni Vienna have now used functional magnetic resonance imaging of the brain and pharmacological investigations to demonstrate that there is a close relationship between the speed of the serotonin uptake in blood platelets and the function of a depression network in the brain.

This network is termed the "default mode network" because it is primarily active at rest and processes content with strong self-reference. Findings from recent years have also demonstrated that it is actively suppressed during complex thought processes, which is essential for adequate levels of concentration. Interestingly, patients with depression find it difficult to suppress this network during thought processes, leading to negative thoughts and ruminations as well as poor concentration.

This is the first study that has been able to predict the activity of a major depression network in the brain using a blood test. While blood tests for mental illnesses have until recently been regarded as impossible, this study clearly shows that a blood test is possible in principle for diagnosing depression and could become reality in the not too distant future. This result means that the diagnosis of depression through blood tests could become reality in the not too distant future.