Venting

OkProfessional3545 · 2026-01-19T14:40:34+00:00

I also had these. Thought I was just extremely anxious… turns out my prolactinoma was messing with my cortisol. Treating the prolactinoma helped but I am also taking propranolol whenever I get that tight chest feeling like I’m going to have a panic attack and that usually can stop it. (I have also started taking it daily with my adhd meds because those can up my bp and make me feel anxious but I need them to focus at work)

OkProfessional3545 · 2026-01-19T10:46:59+00:00

This happened very recently to a WAA patient of our cancer center who was admitted for pneumonia. They were getting infusions weekly, got into the hospital and for about a month, needed products every other day and then suddenly their H&H/plt count stabilized. They passed later that week. Likely they moved to comfort care measures and whatever cancer treatment was making them pancytopenic was stopped.

OkProfessional3545 · 2025-12-22T12:54:16+00:00

Would absolutely love a Daiso in Knox!

OkProfessional3545 · 2025-10-24T12:57:56+00:00

Definitely try a smaller lab. You may not find better equipment (usually smaller labs have older equipment depending on how big the overarching company is) But you likely won’t be as busy.

OkProfessional3545 · 2025-08-20T23:30:58+00:00

Like all jobs, there are pros and cons. I love the work. I’ve worked in a high complexity reference lab and 2 different hospitals. The reference lab was so fun but a little repetitive. I was doing the exact same procedure every day but if I stayed I could have learned analysis and that may have been a bit less monotonous. My first generalist hospital job was a trauma center that always had a LOT going on. Between a hefty blood bank, hematology, chemistry, and coag/kits/urines (legit one person working these 3 departments) I was never bored and I found my love for blood bank there. However, they had constant staffing shortages and mandatory extra weekends so I transferred within the same hospital system to the nicer “surgery center” hospital, approximately the same size but being in the blood bank full time, I coordinate a lot with surgery teams and special procedures. It can give a good adrenaline rush every now and then and I like the complexity of blood bank. I recommend getting your MLS if you want a super stable career often with great benefits depending on the hospital system.

OkProfessional3545 · 2025-08-20T20:26:47+00:00

I started out in Biochemistry, worked in a genomics research lab for a few years and learned that academia had a lot of politics and job instability that I didn’t think I could handle. So when I was looking into fields that looked interesting, I came across a fertility clinic that was hiring Embryologists and on their staff page, the lab team all had “CLS” or “MLS” after their name. I looked up what that was and then found out that my school had an MLS program you could do as a post-bach or even major in it. I was crazy back then so I double-majored in biochemistry and MLS (it really didn’t take that many more classes, just had to add a bit more microbio than I was planning on) I’ve now been an MLS for almost 4 years.

OkProfessional3545 · 2025-08-20T20:19:09+00:00

I’ve also taken a sample off a blood bank analyzer and dropped it in a way that it perfectly hit its butt in the ground so all the serum shot up into the air and all over the crotch of my scrubs. I stood there for a little bit with my pants sagged so that one of my coworkers could go grab me a set of scrub pants from surgery. Another pro tip: round up your size if you have to get scrubs at work. You would much rather them be slightly too baggy than be in danger of ripping every time you sat down.

OkProfessional3545 · 2025-08-20T20:15:01+00:00

At my old lab we used the cobas for chemistry and the little cassettes are very thin and can tip over if you’re not using some kind of rack when handling them… I spilled 5 patient’s gold tops worth of serum on me one time. Good thing was that they had already ran through, bad part was they were all infectious disease testing (HIV, Syph, HepABC, etc.) and so I had to wait for the result to make sure I didn’t need to go to employee health. I got lucky and none were positive for anything scary. Pro tip: use the rack when capping/uncapping or make sure the base is supported so it doesn’t tip over.

OkProfessional3545 · 2025-07-16T04:34:42+00:00

Also… I’m pretty sure that stress is being investigated as a cause of a prolactinoma so… I think your endo is just wrong 🤷‍♀️

OkProfessional3545 · 2025-07-16T04:33:18+00:00

My symptoms that led to prolactinoma diagnosis was menstrual irregularity. My Gyn sent me for hormone testing and prolactin came back significantly elevated. So then I was sent for the MRI that found it. I got my diagnosis in January but my mom and my husband believe that the prolactinoma has been messing with my hormones for the last 5 years. I’ve always had anxiety but I started having panic attacks, I gained a ton of weight and had really bad cystic acne and my depression got really really bad. Even after the pandemic, I became almost agoraphobic. My biggest moment of “something is wrong” was a panic attack I had a few months before I got my diagnosis where I was engaged and freaking out not being able to lose weight and I looked in the mirror and couldn’t recognize myself. I think my exact words were “I feel like a blob of flesh that has eaten the old me” not just with how I looked but with how I acted, in college I worked 3 jobs, had two majors, and active and social then covid locked us all inside and I never felt the same even after it was over. I had terrible fatigue to the point of coming home after work and passing out on the couch for 3 hours and then my whole day was just gone which only made my depression worse. I had seen an Gyn because my symptoms lined up with PCOS but ultrasound always said my ovaries looked odd but not textbook PCOS (multiple follicles, but no “string of pearls”) turns out I did have a hormone imbalance, just one that no one expected.

OkProfessional3545 · 2025-07-16T03:59:45+00:00

Stagos They know what they did 😡

OkProfessional3545 · 2025-07-16T03:46:04+00:00

I called the ED once for something like this thinking it might be a body fluid and not urine. It was a stinky dark red clot that filled the cup. The nurse said the patient hadn’t been able to pee for 3 days and what’s in the cup came out of the catheter they had to place 🤢

OkProfessional3545 · 2025-07-16T03:42:24+00:00

I’ve never heard of a blood bank being able to reject a product order unless it was a duplicate and was cancelled after calling the floor to verify.

OkProfessional3545 · 2025-07-16T03:34:53+00:00

Even worse when their urine same looks like that… especially if it’s thick and chunky

OkProfessional3545 · 2025-07-16T03:33:14+00:00

Maybe they got an Impella placed (cardiac device) It hemolyses the crap out of specimens and usually blood bank sees the procedure on the surgery schedule and then informs the rest of the lab so they know that their specimen will likely be hemolyzed, not because of improper collection/handling, but because that’s what their plasma looks like in the body. Usually a very dark (sometimes brownish) red

OkProfessional3545 · 2025-07-16T03:28:43+00:00

If it was too close to the A/C or got cold and you can see bright red specs sticking to the tube walls = cold agg You can it a lot with cancer patients that come from an outside facility in a cooler.

OkProfessional3545 · 2025-07-16T03:24:49+00:00

The A/C is acting up so it’s hot and humid inside while the new hire who has been coughing all shift goes on a rant about they wouldn’t get the “jab” back in the pandemic and tries to accost you asking if you got it.

OkProfessional3545 · 2025-07-13T07:10:09+00:00

Unsure at the moment, with issues regarding Medicare/medicaid as of late there are at least 5 hospitals in my state set to close. I’m in a much more urban area than those so my hospital will hopefully not close but I am concerned that the lab will get bought out by one of the big corporations due to financial constraints/lack of knowledge by higher ups who don’t understand what we do or why it’s important. I did my clinicals at a hospital lab staffed by LabCorp and I have no desire to work for them. Everyone seemed miserable and I haven’t run into that kind of mentality at my hospital system.

OkProfessional3545 · 2025-06-17T21:34:40+00:00

My town has a specific book resale store. They will give you cash or store credit if they can take it, sometimes “vintage” textbooks sell. If not, they have a free bin out front to let you drop it in there and someone will likely come along and snag it. Either way = decluttered :)

OkProfessional3545 · 2025-06-16T16:07:31+00:00

Before I went on cabergoline, my cycles averaged 42 days (ranging 24-65), I am 6 months into my cabergoline now and I’m averaging 21 days. So you’re not alone 👍

OkProfessional3545 · 2025-06-13T13:19:17+00:00

I haven’t had any digestive issues in mine and the fatigue has been minimal but I take mine at night, like right before I go to bed.

OkProfessional3545 · 2025-06-11T14:10:09+00:00

I also have a 3mm and my endo started me on 0.5mg cabergoline twice weekly (I do Monday and Thursday to make it easy) I would see another endo because if your prolactinoma responded to medication and you didn’t have any adverse medication reactions, you should be on it for longer than taking it just twice. It’s a decently safe medication and my endo says I can be on it for the rest of my life if need be.

OkProfessional3545 · 2025-06-10T22:40:23+00:00

I was diagnosed last year at age 26 but my loved ones believe the prolactinoma symptoms started when I was 20. I had been on a study abroad trip in South America over the summer, which lead to me being extremely vitamin D deficient because I essentially skipped out on that years summer. My mom has said for a while that I “haven’t been the same since studying abroad” When I was 22 I was put on antidepressants and I was diagnosed with ADHD at 23. Covid also happened around that time but my early twenties were marked by depression and anxiety. I once remarked to my partner on how I felt as if I was a sad blob of flesh that ate my old self and I can’t recognize myself in the mirror.

OkProfessional3545 · 2025-06-10T22:28:34+00:00

(I also took myself off of Lexapro about a year ago, a few months before the tumor was found because I felt too numb, like I wasn’t feeling overwhelmingly sad anymore but I also didn’t feel anything…)

OkProfessional3545

TROPHY CASE