Health Screening vs Health Test: What’s The Difference?

Test: A medical test is used to diagnose an illness or health condition. A test will be performed if you’re showing symptoms or if there’s some other reason to suspect you might have a particular condition. The purpose of the test is to get more information that will help your healthcare provider make a diagnosis or decide on a treatment. In some cases, it will be looking to confirm something and in others, it may be looking to rule something out. The test is specific – your healthcare provider is ordering it especially for you in that particular situation. For example, a Covid test checks to see if you have Covid-19. An MRI is also a test because your healthcare provider is looking for something specific.

Screening: A screening is all about being proactive. The idea is to pick up underlying issues before you show symptoms. That way you can follow up with a diagnostic test to confirm whether you have a condition and start treatment as early as possible before any serious damage occurs. Screenings are usually not specific – there are broad guidelines that can vary from country to country. For example, women over 40 years old are encouraged to have an annual mammogram but some protocols might suggest starting at a younger age or only getting one every two years. The newborn blood spot screening (NBS) for babies is another example – it screens for a range of conditions that can become serious later on if they’re not caught early.

Exciting news from Ajuda, especially if you’re expecting: We’ve partnered with the Centre for Human Metabolomics (CHM) at North-West University, which is the only laboratory in South Africa that processes these blood screenings. Eventually, the partnership will see your baby’s NBS results uploaded directly to your Ajuda digital vault, so your child will have a lifelong medical record starting from their first screening at birth.

“What usually happens is the laboratory communicates the results to you and your doctor soon after birth, so any necessary actions can be taken right away, but this result record remains in the doctor’s file. Through this partnership, we aim to reach a point where the result will be automatically uploaded to the patient’s Ajuda vault,” says Dr Liza Street, a paediatrician and co-founder of Ajuda. “This is important because the healthcare provider who was with you for your baby’s birth may not be the same one you go to later. Now, those results remain within Ajuda, so whoever treats your child, you will be able to supply them with that information.”

The NBS is just the start of a baby’s health screening journey – many screenings will follow and these results can also be easily added to Ajuda, building a solid foundation for your child’s healthcare in the future. Storing results is easy – just open or create your child’s profile on Ajuda, open the screenings folder to name and date your record and upload the result. Easy as that!

“That first year of a baby’s life is so full of data gathering and it’s also the time when parents are sleep-deprived and adjusting to their new normal. Probably the last thing on their minds is where they’re going to store their baby’s health records so they can find it again in two, five, or ten years’ time,” says Ajuda co-founder, Taryn Uhlmann. “Ajuda makes it easy. We’re there to hold your hand and be your digital friend so you can be empowered with a lifetime record of your family’s health.”