CBC doubts

Published Mar 25, 2005

1 Post

Hi Everyone,

I am not a nurse, but would greatly value any information you may give me. I am 27 y/o female with bouts of hypochondria or as my therapist calls it "health anxiety" (very politically correct; ) and OCD; great combination. These things usually happen when I'm stressed. Anyway, I've thought I've had everything from skin cancer to brain tumors. My latest problem is that I decided I had leukemia. I went to my doctor 4 days in a row-she is very understanding and has a lot of patience with me, but firm when she needs to be. The last time I was there about a month ago ranting about leukemia, she had CBC drawn with various other things like thyroid and liver function tests.

Everything came back the next day normal so I was very happy until about a week ago when the doubts started creeping in, as they usually do. I started thinking- What if this isn't really my blood work? What if it was mixed up with someone else's? How does the blood analyzing machine know which results belong to which patient? Is there a bar code on the label on the tube? I really wish I would have asked these things, but didn't think about them at the time. My mother and husband just tell me that it's my blood and they're sure there's a procedure to make sure there aren't mix ups and the blood machine works just fine. They are always ready to accept their results, but yet I want to know exactly HOW things work. So I was hoping some of you have some insight into how those blood analyzers are able to do so many tubes of blood at one time and somehow the results are sent to the computer. That's my understanding of it anyway.

My common sense tells me that the lab is probably one of the most organized places in the hospital and they're used all day every day and the doctors trust the results, so why shouldn't I. However, the illogical part of me just imagines a big jumble of tubes sitting around and machines malfunctioning. Please help if you can to explain how things work with the handling of blood work. I really am quite intelligent when I'm not going through this! I can't go back to the doctor because I've already been 4 times in the past month and insurance won't cover it and I don't know anyone who is in the health care field, so I appreciate any info you can give. Thanks for understanding, K