Quote:
Originally Posted by Northrick
For my edification and to distill it all down, you are saying he should have a blood test done, not a urine test?
As far as the reason, maybe the OP just wanted to know or maybe it was work related. I had annual testing for decades because I worked on contaminated sites and lead was included in the blood tests.
|
Everything is regimented in medicine based on clinical studies. There isn't much creativity when it comes to diagnosing disease. Each test submitted to the FDA for approval has to have a documentation of clinical studies showing the utilization of the test and how well it achieved that goal. We have three tests that target lead toxicity. We have as state environmental exposures as the biggest cause and work exposure being one big one.
When talking about ingested toxins in general one is talking about acute ingestion where it shows up in the blood first and then later on it appears in the urine. So generally a blood test for acute and urine test for chronic exposures. The problem is that heavy metals like lead and mercury are not normally excreted by the body in large amounts. The organs and tissues retain them causing damage. They are mobilized via chelation.
Screening for children involves blood draws,
https://www.cdc.gov/lead-prevention/...nce/index.html
Work place exposure
https://www.cdc.gov/niosh/lead/preve...r-workers.html
ARUP Labs
"May be useful in the assessment of chronic lead exposure or in monitoring chelation therapy. For routine testing of lead exposure, Lead, Blood (Venous) (0020098) is preferred. For occupational exposure, consider Lead, Industrial Exposure Panel, Adults"
The adult exposure panel include a blood lead level and a FEP level.
"Quantification of urine excretion rates before or after chelation therapy has been used as an indicator of lead exposure. Urinary excretion of >125 mg of lead per 24 hours is usually associated with related evidence of lead toxicity."
https://ltd.aruplab.com/Tests/Pub/0025060#
The biggest question is who ordered it and why didn't they do a blood test for lead? Why was a random urine done and not a 24 hour collection which is more accurate?
I am just guessing here but one possible reason why urine is used as opposed to blood is because it does not require a phlebotomy. Alternative practitioners can collect urine on their own rather than having to have blood sample as a source for testing. That is why there is suspicion as to the whole scenario and context of the testing.
It would be nice to see the actual test results with units and reference ranges on the report. One also needs to see the creatinine result when testing urine as simply looking at the concentration by itself doesn't tell us if the urine was concentrated or diluted. That is one advantage of using blood rather than urine. Urine can practically turn into water while blood can't do that. One needs to do a creatinine level on random urines or collect a 24-hour urine which I presume was not the case here.
The OP mentions recs less than 1.1 which I can't find anywhere. A report would not have statements such as recommendations less than 1.1 mcg. That language isn't the type used for reporting reference ranges. The term "recs" or recommendations is something one finds in a book which is separate that one sees in reports.
Please register to participate in our discussions with 2 million other members - it's free and quick! Some forums can only be seen by registered members. After you create your account, you'll be able to customize options and access all our 15,000 new posts/day with fewer ads.
