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Risk from lancet?
I checked my blood sugar this morning using one of my family member's glucose meter out of curiosity today. I am wondering if I have to worry about testing for Hep C as I do not know that person's status.
Key things to note -
1) I placed a brand new needle inside the lancing device, although the device belongs to my family member
2) I placed a brand new glucose testing strip inside the meter
Do you guys recommend I get tested?
Thank you everyone!
Key things to note -
1) I placed a brand new needle inside the lancing device, although the device belongs to my family member
2) I placed a brand new glucose testing strip inside the meter
Do you guys recommend I get tested?
Thank you everyone!
I concur, no risk from this event. You used a new needle and a new testing strip, so no one else's blood came in contact with your body.
You don't even know if your family member has Hepatitis C - and even if they did, it would still be a no risk situation.
To put this in perspective, in health care settings, doctors and nurses who accidentally stick themselves with a needle that has just been used on a patient that they know is Hepatitis C positive only are infected at a rate of less than 3% of the time - 97% of the time, nothing happens. What happened to you isn't even close to a bloody needle stick, so your odds of becoming infected are non-existent.
No need to get tested for this. However, the next time you get a check-up, you may want to have your doctor run the test for Hepatitis C just to set a baseline in case you ever have an actual exposure in the future so you can say "look, I was tested back then and it came back negative". You might also want to have an HIV test (and other STDs if you are sexually active) for the same reason.
You don't even know if your family member has Hepatitis C - and even if they did, it would still be a no risk situation.
To put this in perspective, in health care settings, doctors and nurses who accidentally stick themselves with a needle that has just been used on a patient that they know is Hepatitis C positive only are infected at a rate of less than 3% of the time - 97% of the time, nothing happens. What happened to you isn't even close to a bloody needle stick, so your odds of becoming infected are non-existent.
No need to get tested for this. However, the next time you get a check-up, you may want to have your doctor run the test for Hepatitis C just to set a baseline in case you ever have an actual exposure in the future so you can say "look, I was tested back then and it came back negative". You might also want to have an HIV test (and other STDs if you are sexually active) for the same reason.
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