What Does My Blood Test Report Indicate?

Posted on Thu, 25 May 2017

Medically reviewed by Ask A Doctor - 24x7 Medical Review Team

Thu, 25 May 2017 Answered on

Mon, 12 Jun 2017 Last reviewed on

Question : Mom is 92. She has been on plavix for 2 Weeks for afib and some XXXXXXX stroke symptoms. No problem in last 2 weeks. She has to get blood drawn in 7 days for blood test.. She also has to get trigger point injections from her pain doctor in her low back area ( probably a steroid of some sort) in 10 days. In both if those instances... does she have to stop the plavix before doing either?? If so... how long ?

Answered by Dr. Indranil Ghosh (48 minutes later)

Brief Answer:
For blood drawing no problem

Detailed Answer:
Hi
Thanks for your query.

For blood drawing, not necessary to stop plavix at all. But the steroid injection is tricky. From your description it seems to be inside the joint (intraarticular). That carries a high risk of bleeding while on plavix. Hence a 10 day gap is desirable.

Basically you then need to check if the procedure is essential and if so, the cardiologist has to give a go ahead to stop it. I get a feeling that you need to postpone the steroid thing.

Hope this helps.
Regards

Above answer was peer-reviewed by : Dr. Chakravarthy Mazumdar