I had a flurry of questions about the blood testing. The most common one was, what is the minimum amount of blood we need in order to run a full biochemistry panel?
The minimum amount of blood we need is 0.5mL. Blood collection tubes come in all sizes and I’ve included a picture of the common sizes used (from left to right, 10mL, 5mL, 2mL and 1mL). The amount of anticoagulant to blood ratio shouldn’t be too much of a problem if running a biochemistry panel. It is only an issue if you’re wanting haematology since excess anticoagulant can rupture your cells, and too little will lead to a clotted blood sample. Of course there are a heap of other complications, but I’d best leave that to a specialist clinical pathologist to answer.
