Blood, the vital fluid that sustains life, carries a vast assortment of substances.  Various organs of the body contribute enzymes, antibodies, internal secretions and hormones to the bloodstream.  Simple blood tests detect many of these substances for the purpose of diagnosing disease.  These tests save patients time, pain, aggravation, and the risk of invasive procedures.

Now researchers in England are developing a blood test to predict the likelihood of coronary heart disease.  This test combines high tech analytical procedures with a mathematical modelling technique to examine changes in hundreds of substances in the blood.

Researchers selected two groups of patients who had undergone angiogram procedures - those whose results indicated significant coronary artery disease and those with no such disease.  Next the scientists compared the blood samples from these two groups.  Based on the results of the blood testing alone, researchers were able to correctly predict which people had the coronary artery disease. As well, they were able to gauge the severity of the disease.

The development of a rapid blood test for coronary heart disease could revolutionize the provision of health care for heart disease.  It would allow widespread screening so that at risk groups could be efficiently targeted for cholesterol lowering drugs.

So next time you go for a check up, let them have that blood. It can tell the doctor more than ever before.

MOVING BEYOND MATTER
by William G. Hobbs

Our life is in our blood.  And in more ways than one.  It keeps us alive; it carries oxygen and nutrients to the extremities of our bodies, as well as antibodies and immune cells to fight diseases.  It carries a fingerprint of our life; our blood contains our DNA, the microscopic blueprint of who we are.  And it carries a record of our life; as Dr. Humphreys pointed out, breaking down the components of our blood can reveal what diseases we have and how severe they are.

We've learned much in the area of the importance of our blood.  Just over two hundred years ago it was common practice for a doctor to diagnose a patient with "too much blood" and prescribe a blood-letting as treatment.  If the patient got better the treatment was hailed as successful.  If the patient's condition worsened they would let out more blood - sometimes until the patient died.  Today we know that these people bled to death and the treatment seems more like some sadistic torture, but then doctors believed they were doing everything they could.  But why did the treatment change?

Well, more research was done.  Some treatments were found to be better than others.  The better ones were kept, the others abandoned.  That's how we got to where we are today and that's how we will get to new discoveries in the future.  One of the major factors is time.  Does the treatment, or way of thinking, or whatever stand up to the test of time?

In high school science we had a textbook full of experiments.  Experiments that had been done hundreds of times before, and whose outcome was known.  We could do the experiment to see for ourselves or we could trust conclusion written in the textbook.  The experiments in the textbook had passed numerous scientific tests and had passed the test of time.

Jesus made this claim about the words he spoke, "Heaven and earth shall pass away, but my words shall not pass away." (Matthew 24:35).  He asserted that his teachings would pass the test of time.  They've already lasted almost 2000 years.  Have you considered putting them to the test in your own life?