Question from an outsider (of medicine and of medical research): Why is this study <i>new</i>? I mean I can understand why it is <i>news</i> (for the mass media)...but isn&#x27;t this something that would&#x27;ve have been tested long ago to a certain degree? At least to a degree in which, today, doctors are content that a venous draw is a statistically useful amount of blood to derive health results from? Wouldn&#x27;t that have to based on some study that purported to find the minimum volume of blood needed to reliably represent someone&#x27;s health?<p>Not only does it seem like a very fundamental question to have already asked...it doesn&#x27;t even seem like a very difficult study to <i>do</i>. It&#x27;s not substantially longitudinal over time -- for every subject, you take several pinpricks, and run the tests. Or logistically difficult to manage.<p>So I get why it&#x27;s news, in terms of Theranos and what not...but this has to have been something that was studied many times over many decades. Or is the NYT misinterpreting&#x2F;signifying the significance, i.e. the Rice scientists found a previously undetectable kind of difference, but which is, yes, technically shows that blood drops are different?