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NEW YORK DAWN™ > Blog > Health > Why you often want quite a lot of drops of blood, saliva or urine to detect diseases
Why you often want quite a lot of drops of blood, saliva or urine to detect diseases
Health

Why you often want quite a lot of drops of blood, saliva or urine to detect diseases

Last updated: May 16, 2025 12:37 pm
Editorial Board Published May 16, 2025
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Credit score: Pixabay/CC0 Public Area

Within the 2000s, biotech firm Theranos promised to revolutionize blood testing. Founder Elizabeth Holmes claimed Theranos know-how may carry out tons of of assessments utilizing only a finger-prick drop of blood. If true, their diagnostics can be sooner, cheaper and extra accessible.

Theranos raised tons of of thousands and thousands of {dollars} from buyers and was valued at greater than US$9 billion in 2015.

Nevertheless, the know-how by no means labored, resulting in one of many greatest scandals in biotech historical past. Theranos was secretly utilizing conventional machines to run many assessments, then claiming the outcomes got here from its personal (non-functional) machine. Holmes was finally convicted of fraud and sentenced to 11 years in jail.

Right now, a brand new startup, Haemanthus, claims to have developed an analogous know-how. Co-founded by Billy Evans (Holmes’ associate), this new firm says it might detect and diagnose diseases utilizing tiny quantities of blood, urine, and even saliva.

Whereas know-how has superior since Theranos’ time, it is essential to contemplate these claims fastidiously.

Clinicians and lab techs can presently detect many situations with blood, and a few with urine or saliva. These are essential instruments in fashionable drugs. Nevertheless, the volumes required are often a lot better than just a few drops or a dab.

What can blood detect?

Blood circulates via all organs, transporting cells, vitamins, hormones and waste merchandise. Blood assessments accumulate a number of milliliters of blood from a vein and ship this to a laboratory for evaluation.

Blood assessments can test if an individual has indicators of an infection or illness, to observe organ operate, or to indicate how an individual is responding to medical therapy. Blood assessments are extensively used to observe coronary heart illness, diabetes, kidney illness, or deficiencies in iron or nutritional vitamins.

A major proportion of medical selections are based mostly on laboratory evaluation of blood assessments. Making them extra inexpensive and accessible would have nice advantages.

What about urine?

Urine is produced by the kidneys and accommodates waste filtered from the blood. The colour and composition of urine provides you a snapshot of any issues the physique is perhaps making an attempt to repair.

Urine evaluation can detect urinary tract infections, kidney problems, diabetes and liver ailments by measuring sugars, proteins and cells.

As urine assessments are non-invasive and straightforward to manage, they can be utilized to shortly display screen for some situations.

Nevertheless, components similar to how a lot you’ve got needed to drink and what you’ve got eaten can affect urine composition, doubtlessly affecting take a look at outcomes.

Saliva may also be used for diagnoses

Saliva is the clear, watery liquid produced by salivary glands within the mouth. It is largely water (round 99%), but additionally accommodates varied substances similar to hormones, antibodies, enzymes, DNA, RNA and metabolites.

Saliva testing is already utilized in scientific settings to detect HIV antibodies, monitor ranges of cortisol (a marker of stress) and to diagnose viral infections similar to COVID.

The potential of saliva as one other non-invasive diagnostic software is rising, particularly as researchers determine extra markers of illness that it might comprise.

Nevertheless, saliva manufacturing varies between people. The composition of saliva may be impacted by what you eat and drink, the time of day, and even stress. These variations can restrict how constant and dependable saliva may be for making a analysis.

However how a lot of it do you want?

Whereas diagnosing ailments utilizing bodily fluids is not new, Haemanthus and different startups differentiate themselves by aiming (and claiming) to want solely small quantities for a number of assessments: a drop of blood, a swab of saliva, or just a few milliliters of urine. This may imply sooner, cheaper, extra handy assessments that trigger much less discomfort.

However there are bodily limitations of small samples. Many diagnostic markers (known as biomarkers) are solely current in very low quantities in our physique fluids.

When the pattern quantity decreases, so do the quantities of the biomarkers, making it more durable to detect them reliably. That is notably true for biomarkers similar to hormones, most cancers markers, or early-stage illness indicators.

What are you able to detect with just a few drops?

After all, some situations may be recognized utilizing small samples, however usually just one situation is examined for with every small pattern, not like the claims of firms like Theranos.

Finger-prick blood samples, for instance, can monitor blood glucose ranges of individuals with diabetes.

Small urine samples can detect urinary tract infections, however not all forms of infections directly.

The precise biomarkers for these situations may be reliably detectable in small quantities of fluid.

To diagnose extra advanced situations, and even unknown situations, a number of assessments could also be required, every needing completely different pattern preparations. This requires each quantity and precision—two issues assessments with small pattern volumes wrestle to ship.

What occurs subsequent?

Whereas the concept of diagnosing diseases with small fluid samples is promising, particularly for distant or resource-limited settings, the science suggests we ought to be cautious.

Most human ailments are difficult, and we often want complete testing approaches to diagnose them. Relying solely on small fluid samples may result in misdiagnosis, delayed therapies, or pointless interventions.

Improvements in biosensor know-how, machine studying algorithms and biomarker discovery proceed to advance the sector. And sooner or later, quick and dependable small quantity testing could also be potential.

Nevertheless, much more peer-reviewed analysis and regulatory approvals will probably be important to make sure affected person security and diagnostic accuracy.

Supplied by
The Dialog

This text is republished from The Dialog beneath a Inventive Commons license. Learn the unique article.The Conversation

Quotation:
Why you often want quite a lot of drops of blood, saliva or urine to detect diseases (2025, Might 16)
retrieved 16 Might 2025
from https://medicalxpress.com/information/2025-05-blood-saliva-urine-illnesses.html

This doc is topic to copyright. Aside from any honest dealing for the aim of personal examine or analysis, no
half could also be reproduced with out the written permission. The content material is offered for info functions solely.

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