Increased blood glucose concentration (hyperglycemia) is an essential diagnostic feature of diabetes, and normalization of blood glucose is the principal aim of diabetes treatment. Hyperglycemia can also occur in the non-diabetic population when normal hormonal control of blood glucose concentration is disturbed by...

A significant increase in the use of blood tests for the management of trauma patients has had little overall effect in terms of survival following trauma, or the length of time those who survive have to spend in hospital.  This is a headline finding from a recently published study examining the clinical impact of...

Sepsis is a major cause of mortality and morbidity for hospitalized patients around the world. Early intervention can reduce mortality and morbidity from severe sepsis, but signs and symptoms of sepsis are non-specific. Point-of-care lactate has proved to be an invaluable tool for some institutions in standardized...

Arterial blood gas (ABG) analysis generates a number of parameters (listed in BOX 5) that together allow assessment of pulmonary gas exchange, blood oxygenation and acid-base balance. These physiological functions of the blood, respiratory and renal systems are disturbed in a range of respiratory and non-respiratory...

A new parameter called critical reference change value (CrRCV) to be applied for the interpretation of serial measurements of cardiac troponin I (cTnI) is introduced. To illustrate the practical utility of CrRCV a set of clinical examples based on two consecutive cTnI results are presented. Thus three cTnI changes...

The clinical value of any patient test result depends on the quality of the reference interval used for its comparison (interpretation), so that good laboratory medicine practice demands continuous review of reference intervals. There is a paucity of published study aimed at validating the health-associated reference...

Serum bilirubin estimation, which has for some years now been available on point-of-care analyzers, including blood gas analyzers, is probably the most frequently requested blood test in neonatal medicine.  This is because increased serum/plasma bilirubin concentration (hyperbilirubinemia) and consequent jaundice is...

Plasma bicarbonate concentration, a parameter generated during arterial blood gas analysis, is essential to the assessment of patient acid-base status. Blood gas analyzers do not have the capacity to directly measure bicarbonate; instead, it is calculated from measured pH and pCO₂(a), using the Henderson-Hasselbalch...

Although arterial blood remains the gold standard sample for blood gas analysis, it is, compared with peripheral venous blood, a more difficult sample to obtain, and its collection is more painful and hazardous for the patient. These considerations have fuelled a growing interest in study aimed at establishing if...

Diabetic ketoacidosis (DKA), a common acute and potentially life-threatening complication of diabetes that results from insulin deficiency, is characterized by raised blood glucose (hyperglycemia) and metabolic acidosis. Metabolic acidosis occurs due to abnormal accumulation in blood of ketoacids, principally...