What to do when blood test results are not quite “normal”

Picture this: you’re reading the results of your recent bloodwork, and you notice some numbers are teetering on the edge of the normal range. Should you be concerned? “It’s tricky, because in some tests, a borderline result makes no difference. In others, it might indicate an important change in health that we need to follow or act on,” says geriatrician Dr. Suzanne Salamon, assistant professor at Harvard Medical School. About normal ranges and interpreting the numbers When you look at a printout of your lab results, you’ll find the normal ranges for each blood test next to your personal results. For example, if your routine blood work includes a test for calcium in the blood, your lab may list the normal range for calcium as 8.3 to 9.9 milligrams per deciliter (mg/dL). If your result is a 9.1 mg/dL, right in the middle, you can feel confident that your calcium level is normal. But what if a blood test result is at the very low or high end of normal, or even slightly outside the normal range? Is that a red flag? “Don’t jump to conclusions,” warns Dr. Salamon. “Blood test results can vary a little bit, depending on the lab. And many people are consistently on one side or the other of the normal range, and for them, that’s healthy,” says Dr. Salamon. Take, for example, a routine measure of blood urea nitrogen (BUN), a waste product created as your body breaks down the protein in your diet. Excess urea is removed from the blood by the kidneys, so high level...
Source: New Harvard Health Information - Category: Consumer Health News Authors: Tags: Tests and procedures blood test Source Type: news