Blood tests: What to test and what not to test.
What are blood tests?
Blood tests are one of the most common and important diagnostic tools used and are very beneficial in helping assess overall health and well-being. Measuring certain biomarkers within blood provides valuable information regarding overall health, and the functioning of different organs and can even be used for the diagnosis of specific health conditions.
Blood tests can therefore be very informative and empowering, helping both patients and medical professionals better understand the patient’s health and allowing them to make informed decisions on subsequent treatment decisions.
How to test?
Up until recently, blood tests involving a venous blood draw were standardly performed by a trained medical professional as part of a routine check-up procedure, or based on detecting an issue or monitoring certain factors. More recently, however, alternative testing methods have surfaced that permit people to self-test, and make their own decisions on which biomarkers they would like to measure. Now there are a plethora of ways to test for certain biomarkers that utilise other biological samples other than venous blood, such as capillary blood (finger-prick), saliva, urine, faeces, and even menstrual blood (click here to read more about that).
This means that people cannot only self-test in more often a less invasive and less time-consuming manner than before, but people are also now able to make their own decision on what biomarkers they want to test, whenever they choose to. And although this is brilliant in that people are empowering themselves through self-determination whilst gaining knowledge about their health, it could be a waste of time…
DISCLAIMER: THIS BLOG POST DOES NOT PROVIDE MEDICAL ADVICE
The information in this blog post, including but not limited to the text, graphics, images, are for educational and informational purposes only. None of the material within this blog post is intended to substitute medical advice, diagnosis or treatment. Always seek the advice of a qualified medical professional such as your doctor when you have concerns or questions.
What to test?
What biomarker you test, ultimately comes down to what you want to know. But it’s worth knowing that not all biomarkers are appropriate to test. The data of some biomarkers can be pretty useless in a one-off test, with them requiring additional tests for more context and interpretation or more information beforehand.
Why test?
So most people don’t just do a blood test or other test for the fun of it as it can take a lot of time, effort and money. Usually, there is a reason why people want to test in the first place, which is typically one of the three following reasons:
They don’t feel their usual self or are experiencing certain negative symptoms and they want to know whether there is a biological reason behind it. An example of this is when someone is feeling more tired than usual with no plausible explanation as to why.
They want to ensure they are healthy and do a blood test as part of a routine check-up, despite not experiencing any unwanted symptoms. These routine tests are paramount in the early detection of certain issues, permitting earlier intervention and therefore better health outcomes.
They are taking preventative or treatment measures and want to ensure these are having the desired effect. An example of this is when someone has previously seen that they have high cholesterol levels and have implemented a change in lifestyle in an attempt to reduce the levels, and now they want to check that what they are doing is working and they are on the right path. This reason usually comes following a diagnosis and acts to monitor certain biomarker levels over time, enabling adjustments to be made accordingly.
Self-testing
With the pandemic, we have seen a rapid influx of self-testing kits available on the market, including finger-prick capillary blood test kits, saliva test kits, urine, faeces and even hair test kits. Such self-test kits allow people to test usually within the comfort of their own homes and take autonomous decisions on what, when and how to test. This is empowering as it enables people to take control of their health. Many of these self-test kits mean that you can test any biomarker you desire, with usually the only limitation being how many you can afford to test (as they are not always cheap). Now, although we are seeing a rise in tracking health data and it is evident that a lot of people want to know as much about themselves as possible, it is not worthwhile to test some biomarkers, with some not being very valuable in terms of information.
These are just some of the factors that you should take into consideration when choosing which biomarkers to test:
1. Some biomarkers fluctuate
Certain biomarker levels fluctuate and can be influenced by various things, making it difficult to interpret the results from a one-time measurement at only one given time point. For example, blood glucose levels can be influenced by recent meals or physical activity, so it's important to consider these factors when interpreting test results.
2. Some biomarkers provide limited context
Biomarkers such as C-reactive protein (CRP), are just too vague to provide any valuable information on their own and require additional information or being tested in conjunction with other biomarkers. Sometimes this is not entirely useless, as these vague biomarkers can provide insights that can be used for making decisions on further analyses, but the fact that additional tests may be needed to make sense of the results should be taken into consideration when choosing such biomarkers. Taking CRP as an example, this biomarker level can be elevated in response to inflammation, with high CRP levels indicating inflammation. However, this doesn’t provide any information regarding the source of cause of the inflammation. As a result, additional tests are required as well as an evaluation of additional information and data.
3. Some biomarker levels have no consequence
Although it may be tempting to test anything and everything, some biomarkers are just not worth testing. For example, for some minerals and vitamins, it is very unlikely to experience deficiencies due to bad nutrition (within reason). An example of one of these is Vitamin E, which is so rare that clinically relevant Vitamin E deficiency is not well known in modern medicine. Unless experiencing certain symptoms and you have tested all other biomarkers and still have no insight into what could be going on, then it may be useful to explore these less common options, otherwise… what’s the point?
So which biomarkers are good to test?
This depends on what the health concern is or what kind of insights are wanted. So it’s kind of important to know what you want to know before choosing which biomarkers to test.Some useful biomarkers to test for gaining information on general well-being are:
Cholesterol - high cholesterol levels are an indication of an increased risk for heart disease so monitoring these levels can identify and manage the risk.
Hemoglobin A1c (HbA1c): HbA1c levels can indicate average blood glucose levels over the past several months and can be useful in assessing diabetes risk or managing diabetes.
Hemoglobin: Hemoglobin is a more stable alternative to measuring iron levels and provides insights into the numbers of red blood cells within your blood, which can be useful in detecting anaemia.
Vitamin D : Vitamin D deficiency is fairly common, especially during the darker winter months, but low levels can be easily treated with supplements and diet changes, as a preventative measure before any more serious health concerns arise.
It is recommended to do your research to look up the relevance of biomarkers before deciding on which ones to test, that way you can make informed choices based on what it is that you want to know. The best way to do this is by reading the clinical guidelines for the biomarkers that are available to test. If you suspect you have a certain condition or disease, for example, but you aren’t sure which biomarker to test, then the guideline is what experts currently agree makes sense to test. Sometimes there are even symptom-centric guidelines (e.g., in Germany there's a guideline for coughing) if you are not looking for a specific disease.
Check out this blog post (Menstrual blood: the key to better diagnostics) to learn more about why we are looking at biomarkers in menstrual blood…
Blood testing and other tests can be very beneficial for providing health insights, but it all comes down to what biomarkers you test. With the increase of all these lifestyle self-test kits, it’s easy to think that they are all worthwhile, but that’s not the case. Some are (to put it bluntly), pretty meaningless and a waste of time, effort and money. Therefore, it is important to be clued up before deciding on which test to buy or which biomarkers to test. Doing these tests should be valuable and empowering, and not just cause a dent in our wallets. Remember, if in doubt, it’s always best to consult with a medical professional beforehand, even if you just ask them what they would advise you to test. You can always take the results to them after for help interpreting if you are unsure of what the results could mean.
To conclude, blood testing and self-testing are amazing ways to gain valuable information regarding your health and well-being… when the biomarkers tested do provide valuable information.
We hope that this post also provided some valuable information and that next time you feel inclined to do a test, you are a bit smarter when it comes to what to test. theblood are developing the first menstrual blood self-test kits in Europe, and in conjunction with scientists, medical professionals and real people, we aim to deliver smart test kits that will not only help reduce the negative stigma associated with menstruation and menstrual blood but will also provide valuable health insights that are worthwhile.
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