Veins after blood tests

J

JaimieShoutsNever!

New member
Hi everybody.

I just would like to ask if having loads of repeated blood tests (venepuncture) in the same vein/artery (the big vein in the elbow) can scar the veins/arteries and cause any problems as I've always been curious as ever since I've had my first blood test my one particular vein (the big one) plays up on some days. It throbs like as if it's just been done again. It doesn't play up all the time, just occasionally.

Thanks for any advice any of you may be able to give.

Kind regards

Niad
 
watching my son have to have repeated blood draws weekly(checking ammonia levels) because of being in liver failure,then after Tx it was twice a week for about a month i would have to say one big yes to that question. he did start to develop some nasty scar tissue there,in both sides. fortunetly it kind of subsided once the draws were not as frequent. he has them every two months now.

having permanent scarring would not be unusual i suppose,it all would really come down to how experienced the tech really is at doing simple blood draws. over the years,i have seen some who seemed extremely unexperienced and should be still practicing on something other than people,espescially children. and others who could hit that vein with absolutely no problem every time. but some scarring over time simply because of having it done over and over again would not be all that unusual.
if you have ever had a tech infiltrate a vein,meaning they went thru it and not into it like they are supposed to,it could casue some scarring within a vein.

if you really need to or simply want to know if there could be some level of blood flow impairment/inner scarring, having a doppler ultrasound run on those veins would show whether or not there is actual scarring within any vein. it shows that blood flow pretty well and would show inner scarring well too. this is one tool that is used to help find blood clots, so i am thinking scarring would show as well? just what symptoms or problems are you currently having? just so you know,for routine blood draws,they always use a vein and not an artery. there are specfic types of tests where they DO need to use arterial blood,but those are much more obscure. hope that helped niad, FB
 
Hi, feelbad. :)

I was just wondering as I have heard it can cause some scarring having repeated blood tests.

I've had the Practice Nurse/Sister do mine about four times now each month. She always hits the vein right on first try so far.

When you mention infiltrate a vein, do you mean where they go from the side of the vein, not directly in the centre of the vein. I have had that where the same Nurse did that and it scarred a bit more than usual. The hole was to the side of the vein, not in the centre, where I'd have thought it was supposed to be.

The symptoms I have are occasional throbbing like when they first do it sort of thing. That's pretty much the only symptom. It's just a bit annoying when I am trying to do something and then it throbs for no reason.

Thanks for your advice and help, FB. :)

Kind regards

Niad
 
when infiltration happens during any type of needle insertion,such as a blood draw or even when starting an IV,it simply means 'thru and thru'. they actually are holding the needle usually at too much of a higher angle so when they go to "stick' it goes completely thru the vein(both walls of) and not "into it" as it is supposed to. does that make sense? you can usually tell somone who has had an infiltration by just looking at the draw site,blood will be under the skin in the form of a bruise? some will only bleed a bit but others can bleed alot,espescially if they are on aspirin or blood thinners.

as long as they actually "hit" the inside of that vein,even if they actually somehow get in thru more of the side,it still would be okay only as long as that needle gets into that vein. you can tell as soon as the person doing the test pulls back on that plunger part of the syringe? just look for that 'flash" of blood as soon as they pull back and create that suction(the "draw"). if you don't see blood,then they either missed the vein completely or infiltrated right thru it and out the other side of that vein.

if i may ask,just why do you need that many blood draws per month? about the only thing you can do to try and prevent scar tissue,tho with that many draws it would be kind of hard to avoid it,is change the vein spots that are being used around a bit so you are not hitting that same vein over and over again so quickly,you know what i mean? giving the veins kind of a "rest' in between the seperate draws really would be about the only thing i can think of to help your situation.

there is another form of set up called the butterfly that uses the vein a bit further down from the one in the inside elbow area? this is my and my sons particular favorite(it doesn't hurt as much,espescially when they have to change out the tubes?),it also is much harder to actually infiltrate with this set up since it has to be help totally parallel to the vein in order to just slide it into the vein at all. just a really good suggestion. hope this helped niad,Marcia
 
Hi, Marcia and thank you for your help and advice. :)

I understand what you mean by infiltration now. Sometimes I've had a very small bruise but not that noticeable so I don't think they infiltrated my vein too much. Mainly it just leaves a hole where the needle went and slight tenderness.

The reason I have needed this many blood draws (1 once a month) is because I have early degeneration of my spine and my foot joints so they are trying to rule out or find out if I've got some sort of rheumatic or auto-immune disease that could be causing it. To add to this I've now started to get a red, raised, round rash on each side of my face, symetrically and the last blood test which I had today was to rule out or find out if I may have a form of Lupus (Discoid or systemic, not sure what the tests were that he ordered for it as he didn't say).

They always use the one same vein (the big one in the elbow) everytime they do it but they tend to use different areas of that one vein where it hasn't been punctured before. I'm not sure if that would help with scarring. She managed to get it on first try again so my vein is probably not that scarred up or blood wouldn't always immediately come through on first try? What I have noticed is that nurses always seem to go for the big vein in the elbow rather than the smaller ones and I just wondered why that may be as I'm curious on that.

I don't think my local doctors use the butterfly. They just use the syringe and needle sort. Is the butterfly the one where it isn't directly into a syringe but attached to a tube and then syringe sort of thing? I've seen them used in hospitals more. I think the reason why it hurts when they change tubes is because the person doing it has to slightly move to get the next tube and this makes the needle move a bit as they reach over for it, not sure. Would I be able to request a butterfly if I had to have one at hospital or does the phlebotomist/nurse make the decision? I just wondered as it seems they seem to have a preference for the way they do it?

Kind regards

Niad
 
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