The notion that orange juice may be harmful to health seems counterintuitive if not bizarre, but as a recently published case history reveals, orange juice contains significant amounts of potassium and ingestion of large quantities of orange juice can lead to hyperkalemia of sufficient severity to threaten life.  Over ...

Umbilical cord blood gas analysis provides objective evidence of neonatal condition at birth; a particular utility of the test is to identify those babies who have suffered significant oxygen deficit prior to delivery. Traditional obstetric practice is to clamp the umbilical cord within seconds of delivery but some...

Despite significant developments in neonatal medicine over the past decade or two there has been no overall reduction in the number of neonatal deaths according to the results of a recently published US study.  Researchers at the University of Colorado in Denver performed a retrospective study of all 779,385 live...

Arterial oxygen saturation sO₂(a) is a parameter calculated during blood gas analysis that is useful for monitoring respiratory function. Pulse oximetry provides a safer and more convenient, non-invasive means of measuring oxygen saturation that is used in many clinical settings.  The value of pulse oximetry depends...

Intensive intravenous insulin therapy directed at maintaining blood glucose concentration within tight normal limits (4.4–6.1 mmol/L) is now a standard of care for the critically ill. This requires frequent point of care blood glucose testing.   For appropriate intravenous insulin dosing it is vital that the chosen...

The ‘gold standard’ sample for blood gas analysis is arterial blood obtained via an indwelling arterial catheter or by arterial puncture. For a number of reasons capillary blood is an attractive substitute sample that is routinely used in some clinical settings.  The purpose of this article is to examine the evidence ...

It is estimated that a majority of all laboratory medicine errors are errors that occur during the preanalytical phase of the laboratory testing cycle. Such errors have a significant impact on patient safety, staff workload, and hospital costs.  Correctly identifying patients and avoiding specimen-labeling errors are...

With the use of a new Data Management System (DMS) software program [1], the majority of Point Of Care Testing (POCT) equipment throughout the Waikato District Health Board region has been connected to the Laboratory Information System (LIS) and the Hospital Information System (HIS). Prior to the new DMS, viewing...

Introduction of point–of-care testing (POCT) in hospitals requires the use of principles of change management. Manufacturers can support this process. E-learning programs adapted to the local situation with regular updates, a centralized accreditation and user-registration system and service level agreements are...

Measurement of plasma CRP might be helpful in deciding if patients recovering from critical illness can be safely discharged from the intensive care unit (ICU) to other wards, according to the results of a recently published study conducted at the ICU of the Royal Perth Hospital in Australia. A significant minority of ...