Taking Other Tests
Nobody enjoys providing a urine or stool sample, but a medical test conducted on a small sample collected from your body can give your doctor information that can help save or improve the quality of your life.
A fecal occult blood test checks for hidden (occult) blood in the stool. It involves placing a very small amount of stool on a special card, which is then tested in the physician’s office or sent to a laboratory. Your doctor may instruct you to avoid certain medications and follow certain dietary restrictions for several days before collecting the samples.
The American Cancer Society recommends that everyone age fifty and older get an annual fecal occult blood test and a colonoscopy at least every five to ten years.
Providing a stool sample for labwork can be embarrassing. However, a stool culture can provide plenty of important information about your digestive health. The culture checks for the presence of abnormal bacteria in the digestive tract that may cause diarrhea and other problems. A small sample of stool is collected (usually by you at home in a specimen cup), then sent to a laboratory by your physician’s office. It takes several days for the cultures to grow, but the tests will show whether abnormal bacteria are present. If there is bacteria in the stool, it will grow as colonies and look like dots on the surface of the gel. Each bacteria has its own unique fingerprint, so to speak, and laboratory technicians will look at the physical characteristics of the colonies—their shape, color, and some of their chemical properties—to determine which bacteria have taken up home in your colon.
