I went to get blood drawn for labs this past Thursday. It was not planned, but my next nephrologist and endocrinologist appointments are both scheduled for next Thursday. This is good because I can get both sets of labs done with one trip.
The lab visit took longer than usual. It took them almost 20 minutes to combine both sets of lab orders into one list. The phlebotomist ended up drawing ten rubes of blood plus a urine test. The blood stopped flowing freely by the eight tube so she had to press my vein and move the needle around to fill the final two tubes. Still not as bad as the 22+ tubes I had to give for transplant evaluation labs.
I already received some results back. The two items I was worried about were hemoglobin A1C and creatinine. My A1C came back at 7.5% which says I am diabetic, and correlates to an average blood glucose of 169. I was hoping it would be lower, but still an improvement over the 8.0% number from four months ago. My creatinine level was 1.34 mg/dL. This is slightly high, but both my nephrologist and UCLA transplant center were fine with results as high as 1.5. My potassium and calcium were also borderline high, but everything else seems fine.
Life with chronic diseases 