Reader’s Question:

I am so curious as to how they draw blood in a DUI investigation in Jacksonville, Florida. Does the blood have to come from the arteries or veins?

Elsa

Jacksonville, FL

The blood samples from people accused of DUI in Jacksonville, Florida are commonly withdrawn from the vein rather than from the artery. But the blood alcohol content (BAC) of blood taken from the veins could be quite different from the BAC of blood taken from the arteries in a subject at a given time. It is also the blood in the arteries that carry alcohol into the brain, resulting in intoxication; thus, analysis of blood samples taken from the veins can be misleading.

As a matter of fact, researchers have concluded that using a single blood sample taken from the veins to determine an earlier BAC produces a result that is equivalent to a wild guess. In a related article published in 1984, a lot of scientists have measured comparative BAC levels in the breath, venous blood and arterial blood of people who had consumed known quantities of alcohol. The scientists noticed that BAC of blood taken from the artery was higher than that of blood taken from the vein during the absorptive phase that is, while the alcohol was being absorbed by the body. Arguably, the blood samples taken from the veins had higher BAC levels than the blood samples taken from the arteries during the elimination phase of the blood-alcohol curve. Therefore, the blood sample take from the vein during the elimination phase would be analyzed as having a higher BAC than is in fact being carried to the brain.

Tags: blood alcohol content, blood alcohol test, blood test, DUI, DUI lawyer