[mcv]

Sure, if there's a real medical need to wake the patient up, they should absolutely do so. But waking the patient merely to draw blood in the middle of the night when that could just as easily be done in the morning or evening, is stupid and harmful.

[lbriner]

Although as someone pointed out above, if the doctor gets the results in the morning because the bloods were taken overnight, they might be able to discharge the patient immediately and get a bed before lunchtime for another patient. If they wait to take bloods in the morning, the patient might be in another day for no particular reason.

[jyounker]

Five years ago in Switzerland I could get a full blood panel from my Dr's office in the mall within twenty minutes. The blood came straight out of my arm, into the vials, and into vials went into the analysis unit.

Maybe there needs to be some investment in better analysis equipment for routine draws.

[jdironman]

Or maybe an analysis of the analysis process to see what takes so long.