The importance of bloodwork

Just wanted to let everyone know that after three years out and perfect labs every time, my b vitamins all of a sudden took a plunge for no known reason.  Nothing changed on what I was taking.  I am fortunate though because I get my labs done faithfully and switched to injections from sublinguals so I will be fine.  Thought I would share that even somewhat far out with perfect labs throughout things can change...so keep up with your checks. Blessings

Hi Mathilda,

Thanks for the reminder to be ever vigilent in taking our supplements and having our labs done to ensure that what we are doing is working. I'm glad to hear that they were able to detect and correct the anomaly.

Wishing you well and continued success,

Barb

P.S. I love your kitty!

WOW!   That could have set you back so far in health if you weren't on top of your labs!  Good for you!  Does the Doc have any explanation why you suddenly stopped absorbing B vits?  Just curious (as always)   I'm so glad you are going to be fine! Hugs Anita

No reason why ..I take my supps daily and stick to my diet and have maintained my loss.  I am successful in my surgery.  This came as a suprise.  Luckily my knowlege of the need to continue with my follow up appointments and bloodwork assured detection of this problem early and we started the injections before any neurological indicators were present.  I wanted to share because it would have been easy to become complacent at this point...it seems so long ago that I sometimes forget I even had surgery.

Thanks for the post - its good to remember that 'once a WLS patient, always a WLS patient'... I think once the outside looks 'normal' they no longer have to keep up with the vits/supps and bloodwork and that just isnt the case! :-) I get my bloodwork done every 6 months just to be safe!

I'll second this recommendation.  Labs are the only indicator of how your body is absorbing vitamins.  Even if you take the very best vitamins, malabsorption and less stomach acid from surgery may have a large effect on how your body processes your vitamins. Even though I take a very good liquid vitamin, my D levels are not as high as I'd like.  I noted this on labs over the past 2 years. Levels of 8 intially on D, upped to 14 on prescripton D levels of 50K IU, and finally a count of 33 on liquid vitamins.  The only way I would be aware of these numbers were from my labs.  All of my 2 year labs were in normal limits, except I want to increase my D levels. So now I take 5000 IU capsule of D twice daily, as I want my D levels to get to the level of 70 or more, to avoid potential health issues that may result from lower levels of D.   DAVE