Louie's Blood Test

He freaked! He has obviously done this before because he knew enough to try to hang on to his arms and to pitch a fit. It was not easy for him or for us.

On the 23rd of May, we took Louie to the hospital to get some blood tests and stuff (fecal matter) done. After Tina tried to hold him, I stepped in. The nurse did a great job finding the vein right away, but that's where her "great job" ended. She had NO bedside manners of which to speak. When she felt she had enough blood she took the rubber-band strap off and in the process she wiggled the needle - that hurt Louie and he freaked again. She didn't really seem to care. As he was moving around she didn't care that it was hurting him. The needle was poking around in his arm as she fumbled with a cotton ball to stop the bleeding and roughly put that on his arm and wiggled the needle out.

Tina was not her normal stellar self as this was occurring. I'll refrain from the details, but something tells me it was good that she couldn't speak Creole.

The ladies (another one came to check things out) were poking at him trying to distract him from crying after the fact which only made things worse. We left and felt frustrated.

A few days later we got the results back and they showed that out of 7 tests, only 2 were in the normal range. In French his results were:

Hemoglobine gms% = 11.3 -- normal is 13.5 to 17
Hematocrite 34 -- normal is 33-36
Compte Globules Blancs 9250 -- normal is 4000 to 6000
Eosinophiles 11 -- normal is 0 to 4%
Polyneutrophiles 33 -- normal is 50 to 70%
Lymphocytes 56 -- normal is 25 to 40%

These results indicate that something is going on internally.

It appears that the parasite test was negative.

Tina did some research and found some different "normal ranges" to add to the confusion.

It's absolutely amazing the different in cleanliness and in how careful they are with things - including blood and fecal matter. As I was standing there watching her do the fecal test by smearing it on a slide, the liquid solution and fecal matter splattered on the small table where it appears they do everything from fill out forms to take blood. I feel as if I wouldn't complain about ANYTHING in the States anymore.