blood tests in europe

Europe is a big place. Many countries with many different healthcare regimes. I see this is in England, but is it just England you're talking about? I might not be able to offer solutions, but narrowing it down to places you'll be going to will help others have a go at answering your question.

Posted in the England forum but sounds more universal.

I doubt any lab in Europe will take a US doctor's orders. But that isnt an issue. So based on that I can offer this. IF you ever decide to come to Magyarország, specifically Budapest, I will be happy to hook you up with a clinc that can run the tests. You are probably going to have to sit with a doctor for 5 minutes to get an order, then 5 more minutes to draw the blood. I get blood work done every three months and am always amazed just how fast i get results (same day or next morning). Fairly cheap here too.

As for your meds, thats another issue that you might want to track down in advance.

Things can get lost, so the question is can you replace them in your destination countries. If its a critical thing might not hurt to stop early on your visit, get your blood test and a prescription for your meds ... or at least try and determien if they are available where you are going.

Two of my prescriptions are not available in Magyarország but the prescription I got from my doctor in Budapest is honored in Austria and there is a pharmacy service here that runs up to Austria a few times a week to pick up meds for people like me. So my impression is that EU prescriptions work across borders .... but check on that.

In the UK, when Covid testing was on that introduced many people to the services private healthcare could provide - at the time Covid was just one thing they did.
BUPA Healthcare is one example of a national private network who may be able to provide your tests. They may not, but worth the question.
In any event it would be worth looking back to 3 and 4 year old threads and looking for names of such companies as most of them will still exist.

In England there is no place that you could just walk in and request a blood test. I would not even think about trying to get this done via the NHS as the system at the moment is quite overwhelmed and it will be frustrating to deal with.

You will need to contact private healthcare providers and see if they can offer the service you need. There are private GPs in most cities and similarly private hospitals. If you’re in smaller towns or rural areas I think access to private medical care will be quite limited and difficult to access.

https://privatebloodtests.co.uk/products/private-blood-test-for-inr-in-blood

Not totally sure this is the right thing but they only offer it at 16 hospitals nationwide and there is a registration process before you’re able to have the test. Just as an example of how difficult it might be to have to take a test several times a week.

If you're in London, there are many private physicians based in Harley Street. Asking around some of the doctors based there and I'm sure there would be someone who could accomodate you, for a price.

This from BUPA might be useful in the UK. https://www.bupa.co.uk/health/payg/gp-services/diagnostics-tests-and-scans

After several years of going to LabCorp for my PT-INR tests, my doctor hooked me up with a personal CoaguChek testing kit from Roche. I never traveled with it (my vacations always managed to fall between blood draws), but the kit isn't terribly large -- maybe 6"x5"x1.5". You would just need to be able to report your results on Roche's website. Possibly worth asking your doctor about?

Husband needed regular INR test and it was a nightmare when on holiay. In the end he bought a INR monitor so could check his INR regularly. On holiday, he'd email the result to the hospital consultant who would rcommend whether to alter his warfarin dosage. By the end husband got very good at working out any change himself. It wasn't cheap but more than repaid for itself in not having to find somewhere for a blood test and saving on testing fees when on holiday as well as the convenience. Is there anything like this you could buy and use while away?

I used to travel with one too. I discovered it when I went to a clinic in Budapest, and they pulled one out, tested me, and sent me home for about $25. My insurance paid for the one I got when i returned home. I do Elaquis now, so I don't have to fool with it any longer.

for those who talked about point-of-care self-testing (like the roche coagu-chek), thank you for your experience. sadly, there are a few major studies that talk about my specific diagnosis being a very poor fit for such. on average, the results were wildly nonsensical even when testing minutes apart. my doctors, the local ACC, and i gave up on ever getting useful results with the coagu-chek and other personal portable devices. such devices are fine for many maladies, but not mine specifically.

for those who pointed out a specific group (like bupa or privatebloodtests.co.uk), i'll be contacting them to see if they are an appropriate avenue. given i'll also be all over western europe, it would be nice to have other locations to contact prior, as many will shy away from a US order, so setting the groundwork ahead of my visit will be imperative.

i'll also be contacting friends in germany, france, and benelux to see if their GPs might be able to help. i guess i don't understand why more of this kind of information isn't available online given blood draws for people on warfarin are common enough for a variety of conditions. 20 years ago, the NHS was easy to navigate, and a local GP was an inexpensive option. 15-ish years ago, it was the same in the middle-of-nowhere france, a rural GP with no knowledge of english managed to single-handedly take on chronic pain, diagnose the underlying condition quickly and correctly, give me relief, and charge very little for a lot of his time and expertise.

thank you, everyone!

20 years ago, the NHS was easy to navigate, and a local GP was an inexpensive option.

Without getting too political, we’ve had a long period in the UK of austerity and under-investment in the NHS (and public services generally) to the extent that it’s very difficult to get a GP appointment even for us who live here and are registered with a GP.

The last few times I’ve needed to see a GP, my surgery has offered the option of an online appointment with a service called PushDoctor. However my GP is very good at following that up. So, for example, I can get an out-of-hours online appointment with a random GP who might be anywhere in the country - but the next working day, my own GP’s surgery gets in touch to organise any blood tests or follow-up recommended by the online doctor. Even sent me for an MRI at one point.

Obviously PushDoctor, being online, is no good for blood tests, but it might be useful for other people to know about it.

i guess i don't understand why more of this kind of information isn't
available online given blood draws for people on warfarin are common
enough for a variety of conditions,

I guess I am confused if you are asking England specifically or Europe in general. The database you are asking for would be pretty complex for Europe as a whole and for a "generic" condition.

We have a lot of European residents on the forum. Say where you are going, if beyond England, and ask for specific recommendations and i bet you get some suggestions that are a good fit for you. If its England only, I cant help but with a city name I bet there are those that could. If you ever find yourself where I live, I know exactly where to send you. Might cost you $45.

Is it to do with the free market? Health services aren't as much of a commodity you shop for in Europe? People would generally know where they can see a doctor who will do bloods and assess lab results, as a part of their country's universal healthcare programme. There generally isn't so much need for lists of places offering those services.

People with a view from the US can correct me if I'm way off base with that.

I certainly hope that you will be able to get this situated and that you stay healthy during your trip.

travelgirl, what would your advice be to a European traveling to the US? I think it would be just as difficult. I don't know any GP docs in my area that would take on a foreign patient and order their labs for them. I don't believe that local commercial labs would accept a lab order from a foreign physician. I suppose a visit to an urgent care center would work, but it still would be a logistical issue with communicating the results and billing as the center and the lab would likely be 2 different entities.

what would your advice be to a European traveling to the US? I think it would be just as difficult.

This may be one area where the profit motive trumps any other concern.

Foe example, here in Los Angeles we have access to Quest labs - they will happily take your money for any test they're equipped to handle - no referral necessary:

https://www.questhealth.com/shop

I've also found the nearby urgent care facility has significant latitude to act without an MD on premises - you would most likely see a nurse practitioner. Far superior to a hospital emergency room for issues not life-threatening.

markcw, pretty much the same here in Budapest as well. We have a thriving and by US standards very affordable private Healthcare sector that services middle income Hungarians and British and German and Swiss clients.

what would your advice be to a European traveling to the US? I think it would be just as difficult.

i'd like to think the for-profit labs would be happy to take money to provide the service, provided they could verify the need for the labs. worst case, you could visit an urgent care facility or emergency room and (have most of them, anyway) do the labs in-house or with a contractor that would take the vials elsewhere for processing. i wouldn't choose an ER (or, as the UK would say, an A&E) as my first choice, mostly because of exorbitant costs. in an emergency, though, one does what one must. if you came to the pacific northwest, dynacorp/labcorp can be found all around the puget sound/seattle area, frequently inside health clinics and hospitals.

fwiw, i'm not searching for drugs, or even medications for my problem. i'm looking for someone competent to stick a needle into a vein, draw "enough" blood to test, then provide the resulting value to me. the draw itself takes 30-40 seconds, and the labwork a few hours max. with the result, i can take it the rest of the way. seeing a foreign doctor for them to re-diagnose me just to write a permission slip to draw blood might take months to years, especially if they don't personally have that expertise. oh, and i'd need numerous expensive blood draws just for that. the irony... :)

it almost sounds like the easiest way to "fix" this is have my oncologist/hematologist write a 90-day script for something that provides a similar result (anticoagulation), but does not require the testing. for me, the risk is not small -- those drugs may do similar things, but they act differently and can cause their own issues. but, as long as my trip is less than 2-3 months, it might be worth that risk.

thank you, everyone, for a fascinating conversation. i hope to return to the states by mid-spring with notes about how it went, what i found... :)

Between the suggestions Helen, Golden Girl and I made for the UK I think you'd be good. I don't think anyone's suggesting that you'd need re-diagnosed.

To Golden Girl's suggestion of BUPA; they are the premier provider of private healthcare in the UK. A well known brand for many years.

Helen's suggestion may be worth investigating. It seems to be set up to do exactly as you describe.

My suggestion of Harley Street is where you'll find the best private doctors in London. Many people come from all over the world to visit doctors there. In British English a "Harley Street doctor" is a byword for quality. They tend to all be specialists, but as you point out, your needs should be quick and easy, could be carried out by anyone medically trained and maybe wouldn't break the bank. I was referred to a specialist by my NHS GP a few years ago and I ended up seeing him in his Harley Street clinic for three appointments, rather than an NHS hospital, so I can't speak to the cost.

I have a feeling a British A&E might send you away if it wasn't an emergency. It would be a waste of their resources to do the work you describe. It is unlikely they would be set up to bill you anything at all.

Hope you can work it out without the hassle of changing your medication. I think you'd be good for the UK at least with a little forward planning.

Nuffield Health are another of the big private healthcare providers, with 111 facilities around the UK, including a few in Scotland- https://www.nuffieldhealth.com/tests-scans

seeing a foreign doctor for them to re-diagnose me

I think you are going a bit beyond what has been said. You may (probably I think, but I could be wrong) need to have a doctor order the test. That's a world of difference from re-diagnosing you. I think in most countries in a private clinic, you can do this as a walk-in, but it would be better to make an appointment.

DONE

What is missing is your personal effort, beginning today, in which you google for clinics in the various destinations you are going to. Then send an email to a few of them explaining the situation and asking them how you go about getting your test done when you are in their town and the cost.

In less time than this thread has been posted you will have a plan.

It is possible to get a PT-INR blood test without being referred to by a doctor in England. As an example (not a recommendation) Medichecks offers one for a total charge of £94 at their London Laboratory in Wimpole Street (which runs parallel to the aforementioned Harley Street & is equally packed full of medical practices). I would imagine cheaper options are available in less prestigious locations with a bit of a search.