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Housecall, our weekly general-interest e-newsletter, keeps you up to date on a wide variety of health topics with timely, reliable, practical information, recipes, blogs, questions and answers with Mayo Clinic experts and more. Our biweekly topic-specific e-newsletters also include blogs, questions and answers with Mayo Clinic experts, and other useful information that will help you manage your health.
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Why it's done
By Mayo Clinic staffYour doctor may request an ANA test if your medical history, physical exam and symptoms point to a connective tissue disease. Many of the symptoms of connective tissue diseases, such as painful joints and unexplained fatigue, are nonspecific, so the diagnosis depends on a careful physical examination and expert interpretation of test results.
Other tests your doctor may request include:
- Complete blood count. This blood test measures several components and features of your blood to evaluate your overall health and detect a wide range of disorders.
- Urinalysis. This test evaluates a sample of your urine to detect a wide range of disorders.
- More-specific antibody tests. Blood samples are evaluated to determine the presence of particular antibodies, some of which are specific to certain diseases.
- Sed rate (erythrocyte sedimentation rate). This blood test detects inflammatory activity in your body.
- The antinuclear antibody test: What it means. Lupus Foundation. http://www.lupus.org/webmodules/webarticlesnet/templates/new_empty.aspx?articleid=402&zoneid=76. Accessed Aug. 2, 2009.
- Kavanaugh R, et al. Guidelines for clinical use of the antinuclear antibody test and tests for specific autoantibodies to nuclear antigens. Archives of Pathology & Laboratory Medicine. http://www.cap.org/apps/docs/committees/immunology/arpa_124_10_71.pdf. Accessed Aug. 2, 2009.
- Antinuclear antibody (ANA) test. In: Fischbach F. Manual of Laboratory & Diagnostic Tests. 7th ed. Philadelphia, Pa.: Lippincott Williams & Wilkins; 2004. http://ovidsp.tx.ovid.com/spa/ovidweb.cgi. Accessed Aug. 2, 2009.
- Laboratory reference values. Normal values. Rochester, Minn.: Mayo Foundation for Medical Education and Research. 2004. Accessed Aug. 3, 2009.
