The introduction of armband barcode scanning capabilities to point-of-care glucose testing devices has been shown to greatly reduce patient identification errors. Barcodes may be scanned to identify operators, patient identification and reagents. Barcode scanning, however, does not eliminate all errors, and in some...

To assess anemia and reduced oxygen-carrying capacity, a measurement of hematocrit and/or hemoglobin is performed. Whether hemoglobin or hematocrit is preferred depends on different needs and is often determined by tradition.  Both hematocrit and hemoglobin are important hematology parameters for diagnosing...

Disturbance of the mechanisms which maintain normal blood pH is a defining feature of diabetic ketoacidosis (DKA), an acute and life-threatening complication of the chronic metabolic disease, diabetes.  For this reason diagnosis and monitoring of DKA invariably include measurement of arterial blood gases. This...

50-75 % of all newborns develop jaundice during their first week of life [1,2,3]. The decision behind which treatment is necessary and when it should be initiated is based upon a measurement of the concentration of total bilirubin (ctBil) in serum, plasma or whole blood.  It is therefore obvious that it is important...

Numerous method comparison studies of blood gas analyzer methods have been published in the literature; unfortunately, several studies show flaws in one or several aspects of experimental design, execution, statistical analysis or interpretation of results. The most common flaw seems to be an inability to separate...

Measurement of glucose and lactate after 30 minutes of storage at room temperature can give deviating results of up to 5 % [1,2] and 29 % of the reference value [3] respectively [1,4], due to in vitro glycolysis Glucose and lactate are both important parameters in the surveillance of patients in critical care...

Preanalytical errors are said to be the reason for up to 75 % [1] of all errors in laboratory medicine. The diagnostic consequences depend on the magnitude of the preanalytical error.  In worst case, these errors may lead to mistreatment of patients; in all cases, these errors are an extra workload for the hospital...

Although blood glucose measurement is commonly performed, the use of a whole-blood sample introduces complications and compromise in terms of the assay principle, the method of calibration and the expression of results. Most point-of-care systems are calibrated against a method chosen by the manufacturer for...

Identification of products by barcode has been utilized by industry and business for over 30 years. The use of barcodes in the hospital setting is also well established, but in the patient environment, hospitals are still behind industry. For Point-of-Care Testing (POCT), barcodes are highly desirable. Deanna Bogner, ...

With the increasing number of blood tests performed at the point of care (POC), it has become more and more important to perform method comparison studies, comparing new methods to the existing methods used in the laboratory (LAB). This is done primarily to ensure that uniform results are reported throughout the...