Preparing for the Bone Marrow Biopsy

The first thing I recommend is not Googling this or going on YouTube to watch the procedure. I don't think this helps in my experience. I am very supportive of patients being their own advocates and learning as much about their treatment as possible, but usually the things that rise to the top of the algorithm on the internet are the horror stories or painful procedures. So I don't recommend that. What I do recommend is asking all the questions you have about the procedure with your primary treatment team before you get the procedure. Myself and the rest of my colleagues here at Huntsman and I'm sure at other cancer centers are really good at the day of the procedure explaining everything you'll experience and we're happy to answer any other questions you have that weren't answered with your primary team. This is the first thing I do is just think about your questions and ask them because it's not, it's kind of a different procedure. It's somewhat uncomfortable at times. You want to know what you're getting into. As far as day of the procedure to prepare, I would say bring a family member with you, someone who's comforting, someone for moral support. I think that's helpful. In terms of what your doctor should know about medical conditions and meds you take, this procedure because it is the definitive test for bone marrow abnormalities, we can do this procedure on patients with zero platelets. Sometimes that's a reason someone gets a bone marrow biopsy is because they aren't making platelets. We can do this on people with bleeding disorders. We can do this on patients who are taking aspirin or blood thinners. So there are no medications that you have to hold at our center for a bone marrow biopsy procedure. At other centers that may be different so you should always check with your treatment team. But in general, an outpatient bone marrow biopsy is considered a low risk bleeding procedure so you don't have to stop any other medications. No fasting. I usually recommend eating a little something before you come in so you're not too lightheaded or anything so make sure you eat, make sure you drink. Unless there were some other labs they were doing the same day not related to the bone marrow that you had to fast for or if you're getting a PET scan the same day and you had to fast you should know that. But for the bone marrow itself it is not required to fast.