Dr. Cranquis' Mumbled Gripes

I'm an American physician who works in an Urgent Care clinic. I see lots of stupid or funny things that people do with-and-to their health. I cope by mumbling under my breath (and then posting about it on this pseudonymous blog). Thought you might be interested.

(Disclaimer: Questions related to medical topics will be answered to the best of Dr. Cranquis' (and Google's) knowledge, but the internet-delivered wisdom on this blog CAN NOT AND SHOULD NOT SUBSTITUTE for your Real-Life Doctor's personal attention + examination, and your own common sense too! If you think you're having a medical emergency, hang up and go email 911. The author of this blog takes no responsibility for any medical, relationship, scholastic, financial, or other decisions you may make based on information found in this blog.)

Blogs I Follow

Cranquistador Hive Mind: Help a med-student Cranquistador figure out a med-school question

malgosh submitted:

Opinion needed! As a physician, your patient suspects that their immune system may be suppressed; what laboratory/serological testing would you order? Aside from CBC, sed rate, electrophoresis, flow cytometry, measuring levels of Ig in serum. Let’s get creative :) Something quick, easy, and wouldn’t cost an arm and a leg.

So malgosh and I were chatting yesterday, and she brought up this question from a med school class project. I will freely admit, I am terrible at clinical immunology, and I can’t come up with any other answers which fit the criteria (“quick, easy, wouldn’t cost an arm and a leg”) — so I’m passing the buck along to my Cranquistador Hive Mind.

Anybody have any ideas? Drop malgosh a line! Let’s see what the Hive Mind can do.

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wayfaringmd said: how about a TSH/T4, a peripheral smear, or a bone marrow biopsy?
deo-rs liked this
about-hortense said: definitely quoting naturalnightnurse; what about investigating good ol’ HPA axis, too? Btw, we’re scraping the bottom of the barrel here. Gregory would be proud of ya all! :P
naturalnightnurse said: Blood culture, complement, lymphocyte proliferation, test for infections that cause immune suppression (HIV, TB, mono, chicken pox, hepatitis, etc), ANA for RA and SLE, make sure the CBC is with differential. there are also physical s/s such as rash, hair loss, slow healing,…
kebslcn said: Mantoux test. lol guessing.
danicalifornia85 liked this
danicalifornia85 said: Cranquistador, hehe. I like that.
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malgosh submitted this to cranquis