Can someone please advise my last 3 blood test results have shown high RBC / Hb /Hct with the latest counts of RBC 6.15 Hb 188 Hct 0.544 my GP has referred me to haematology but as non urgent just wanted to understand how the referral system works.
Any help or advice gratefully received
Hi @Fenboy and welcome to the forum.
I understand why you need more information. I would be the same. I wonder if you could arrange another appointment with your GP to ask the questions you have. Sometimes we come out of an appointment and have more questions and worries than when we went in.
This is definitely a question for somebody with more knowledge than me. I have copied in the @BloodCancerUK_Nurses who will be able to give you more information.
I have also copied the link below which gives you the number for the blood cancer helpline in case you want to give them a call to talk things through.
Please keep us updated on how you are doing. it’s horrible waiting for appointments and results but if you need to chat there is always somebody on the forum to listen.
Nichola
Thank you, if I don’t hear back soon I’ll book in with my GP again to try to understand what’s going on.
Hello @Fenboy
Thank you for your post and welcome to our forum.
We are sorry to hear that you are going through what we can imagine is a worrying time.
As @Nichola75 has kindly said perhaps arranging a GP appointment may be helpful to go through worries and concerns, you could perhaps ring the GP and see if they know how long the wait may be for a non-urgent referral. You could alternatively, call the switchboard of the hospital you have been referred to, to speak to the haematology secretary. They will be able to look at list of appointment times for you.
Unfortunately, each hospital trust differs in their waiting times for referrals. For a suspected cancer or for symptoms that need urgently investigated to rule this out, patients will be put on the ‘2 week wait pathway’ where the aim in the UK is to be seen within 2 weeks from the referral date.
For non-urgent referrals the NHS states on their website:
‘The maximum waiting time for non-urgent, consultant-led treatments is 18 weeks from the day your appointment is booked through the NHS e-Referral Service, or when the hospital or service receives your referral letter.’
Further information and to search for your specific trust, visit Guide to NHS waiting times in England - NHS however, this may not apply to Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland.
Please keep up updated on how you are doing.
Take care & warm wishes,
Emma (support services nurse)
I have been recently diagnosed…..
Initially my appointment with Haematology was April 2026 !!
However when they saw my blood tests they contacted me and saw me within a week.
I suppose each NHS Trust is different.
Hope it works out for you
Thank you, guess it’s just a waiting game, not really sure if my results are that high, just that they are outside the ‘normal’ parameters.
Awaiting all sorts of consultants, in fact think I have the trifecta of ‘ologies Gastroenterology / Haematology / Urology
All good 
Quick update, now have JAK2 Blood Test booked in for early January 2026, with my Haematology appointment 4 weeks later at beginning of February, so things are moving forward 
Another a quick questions, which I don’t know if anyone else has had experience with, is there link between Blood Cancers, Crohns Disease/IBD and Liver Issues, as I’m also under consultants investigating these, but not sure the different departments always confer.
Hello @Fenboy, thank you for the update - how are you feeling? I’m glad to see things are moving forward for you!
Regarding your question, I’m going to tag the @BloodCancerUK_Nurses in again, as they would be best placed to help answer.
Take care,
Ceri - Blood Cancer UK Support Services
Hi Ceri, I’m feeling positive now things are moving forward, all but slowly and thank you for tagging in the blood cancer nurses, as it is my ever increasing list of symptoms, with no apparent links that I’ve been told of, that is causing me the greatest anxiety.
Hi @Fenboy I always say that there is a lot of waiting and no knowing in the system and I don’t make a patient patient,
Hi Erica
I think I’ve accepted it’s a pathway and not a road, so walking speed it is 
Hello @Fenboy
Good to hear that things are moving forward for you and that you have the JAK2 test and haematology appointment booked in.
Thank you for the questions and it is understandable you ask about links to blood cancers from other diagnoses. We talk this through briefly in our Blood cancer - what is it, symptoms and treatment | Blood Cancer UK where we say:
Blood cancer causes
Although we don’t normally know exactly why someone will develop blood cancer, there are things that we know can affect your risk:
age
sex
ethnicity
family history
radiation or chemical exposure
some health conditions and treatments.
How these factors affect risk depends on the type of blood cancer.
There is no direct link to the diagnoses you mentioned but very important for you to relay your current medications and dates of your other diagnoses to the Haematology team when you see them. I would also suggest writing down any symptoms you may have along with the timings of these.
Once you see the Haematology Team there will be correspondence sent to you, your GP and any other specialist teams that need to be informed. May I ask whether the other teams you see around your health are in the same hospital you are seeing Haematology in? This allows further transparency and ease of communication if needed but if not the teams can still confer as needed.
I do hope this is helpful and please do give the Support Services team a call on 0808 2080 888 (option 1) if you should need to talk.
Best wishes
Gemma
Hi Gemma - thank you for coming back to me, unfortunately I am at the same stage with the gastroenterology team, had a colonoscopy and ultrasound, as I’ve had GI issues for awhile gradually getting worse, biopsies showed high probability of crohns and the ultrasound sound showed echo textures on my liver, so have a surgical phone consultation end of the month to discuss colonoscopy results and awaiting gastro appointment to discuss biopsy findings, think they are also going to look at liver abnormalities. They are all under the same NHS Trust, but just wondered if everything could possibly be linked
Kindest Regards and Happy Christmas
Matt
So, first haematology appointment next Tuesday, to get result of JAK2 test, RCB, Hct & Hgb are all still high on most recent blood test, but fingers crossed that they will be able to give me some answers, or at least put me on a path to find the answers
Always good when you have a plan. Hope you get that next week