more blood tests?? advice please , a tad worried!

[thriftychic]

went to the doctor a few weeks ago , had felt ill for a while. Pounding head when moving about, going dizzy, nausea and already had dodgy stomach which i have taken tablets for for 3 years with no follow up appointment .

anyway, was sent off for a blood test and a brain scan.
full blood count came back , with low hb level (10.5 i think) and i then had another test to see if iron was low. nurse took two lots of blood so maybe tested something else aswell ?
had a receptionist call last week saying there was a prescription for iron tablets waiting for me.

i have now , yesterday , recieved a letter saying the G.p has requested i come for furthur blood tests.
i am a bit worried now. i mean , 3 blood tests ?
any thoughts ??

Have you had an endoscopy or colonoscopy? Could be something really simple causing your anaemia? Did you get results of brain scan? So sorry you're worrying I know it's hard not to.

Dont worry about more blood tests, it is better that they check what is wrong.

They start off with a basic Full Blood Count and then depending onthe results will look at lots of alternatives.

If they have given you iron then they are checking out anaemia. But there are thousands of causes for anaemia and they need to see if they can pin point a specific cause.

I have blood tests almost every day, usually two to three phials (My last HB is 6 - very low)

It is fascinating what they can found out through the blood and I would prefer to have more blood tests done and they found out what is wrong rather than you get sent away and ignored.

What is useful is writing down what tests they are doing and then I search the internet so see what the doctors are investigating, so that I can ask questions when I see the specialist

not had the scan results yet. about 3 years ago my stomach was burning all the time , i was given lansoprazole tablets but every time i tried to come off them the burnig got worse. so , i was sent for an endoscopy and colonoscopy. the endoscopy showed i had h.pylori infection and that was treated but apparently no evidence of acid reflux . i think that could have been because i was still on the tablets . was told to sort my stress out !!
i didnt go through with the colonoscopy. to cut a long story short i was badly treated by the doctor doing the endoscopy and i hotfooted it out of there.

about a year later i wasnt happy about having to still take the tablets , was no better and went back and saw a different doctor. i couldnt understand much of what he said , neither could the nurse but the upshot was, its acid reflux and i ought to take the tablets or else a pre cancerous condition could occur.

Did you have to change your diet?

i tried cutting out various things but never really figured it out.

When do you get the results of your brain scan?

sorry crossed post

It is better to get a problem fixed that take tablets forever. A year seems a long time
Is this a different doctor?

Make sure you go with a list of absolutely everything that has happened, and your symptons, what makes it worse etc. Tick it off as you mention it or hand him the list
He could check out lots of different things he is aware of it. Sometimes doctors notes are unclear so he might not be aware of past problems

And lastly, dont worry, be happy that he is taking you seriously and getting you checked out
Good luck

I hope they sort it out soon for you and I agree it's good they're taking it seriously.

thanx

I also get copies of my blood results - it is good to be able to compare results over a period of time and you also see patterns of when you were ill or not

I

any news?

seems they failed to tell me that the plan was i start on the iron and then have a the third test to see if anything had changed .
i am now going to be taking the iron for a month a being tested again and in the meantime i have to see the gastroenterologist in case my stomach either can tabsorb iron or there is some bleeding going on.