There may be occasions where one of our GPs or our practice nursing team requires you to attend the practice for a blood test. This is usually where we are checking for an illness or ruling something out.

The results are sent off to a laboratory and we usually receive the results in 7 days – depending on what your blood is being tested for.

A blood test is when a sample of blood is taken for testing in a laboratory. Blood tests have a wide range of uses and are one of the most common types of medical test. For example, a blood test can be used to:

• assess your general state of health
• confirm the presence of a bacterial or viral infection
• see how well certain organs, such as the liver and kidneys, are functioning

A blood test usually involves the phlebotomist taking a blood sample from a blood vessel in your arm and the usual place for a sample is the inside of the elbow or wrist, where the veins are relatively close to the surface. Blood samples from children are most commonly taken from the back of the hand. The child’s hand will be anaesthetised (numbed) with a special cream before the sample is taken.

You can find out more about blood tests, their purpose and the way they are performed on the NHS Choices website.

The Practice does not undertake blood tests for the hospital unless they are part of specified ongoing treatments involving INRs for warfarin management, methotrexate or one of a very limited number of drugs prescribed by GPs under specific shared care advice from consultants.

All tests that are required by the hospital must be undertaken by the hospital and you should be booked in to see a hospital phlebotomist.

Why is this?

The clinician who requests the test is responsible for reading the test results correctly. The reason a person may be under a consultant at a hospital is for specialist advice. A GP practice cannot and should not do these blood tests as the result would come back to the GP and not the specialist as they should do. A GP cannot take responsibility for reading the test results for a specialist consultant.

Some drugs (e.g. chemotherapy) may only be prescribed by hospital consultants because they require specialised monitoring blood tests and so for your safety, such blood tests should be taken by the consultant’s team, e.g. hospital phlebotomist.              

The team is based at Cheetham Primary Care Clinic and offers a service to patients in their homes who have multiple or complex chronic diseases. These are accessed by hospital or GP referral – Please contact: 0161 202 8750

The surgery’s district nursing team is based at Cheetham Primary Care Clinic and carry out home visits for patients requiring medical attention in the home. This service is accessed by hospital and GP referral – Please contact: 0161 549 6720

Please note that some of the services we provide are not covered by the NHS. These include, but are not limited to:

• Private sick notes
• Private letters
• Private referrals
• Insurance forms
• Taxi Medical
• Holiday cancellation forms
• Medical reports
• Fitness to travel certificates
• Private prescriptions
• Certain vaccination services

Our fees for these services are in line with BMA-approved national guidelines and can be obtained from reception. Completion times for these services may vary, so please check with reception for more details.

Please contact CGL – 0161 214 0770

Practice Nurses are available to carry out cervical smears for all ladies registered at the practice. Government guidelines advise all ladies aged between 25 years and 65 years of age are screened regularly. For ladies aged between 25 years and 49 years they recommend 3 yearly recalls and ladies aged between 50 years and 65 years five yearly recall. The guidelines are based on previous normal results, ladies with previous abnormal smear results will be advised on a patient specific basis.

 Please contact: 0161 549 6720