In the 70ies of the last century, ther term "preanalytical phase" was introduced in the literature. This term describes all actions and aspects of the "brain to brain circle" of the medical laboratory diagnostic procedure happening before the analytical phase. The author describes his personal experiences in the early seventies and the following history of increasing awareness of this phase as ...

Blood collection devices interact with blood to alter blood composition, serum, or plasma fractions and in some cases adversely affect laboratory tests. Vascular access devices may release coating substances and exert shear forces that lyse cells. Blood-dissolving tube additives can affect blood constituent stability and analytical systems. Blood tube stoppers, stopper lubricants, tube walls, s...

Background. Patients afflicted with Alzheimer's disease (AD) exhibit a decrease in the cerebrospinal fluid (CSF) concentration of the 42 amino acid form of beta-amyloid (Abeta(42)). However, a high discrepancy between different centers in measured Abeta(42) levels reduces the utility of this biomarker as a diagnostic tool and in monitoring the effect of disease modifying drugs. Preanalytical an...

Hemostasis testing is critical to many hemorrhagic and thrombotic disorders, wherein laboratory diagnostics can provide critical information for diagnosis, prognostication, and therapeutic monitoring. Due to this crucial role in modern medicine, hemostasis tests should be carried out at their highest degree of quality, thus encompassing standardization and monitoring of all phases of the testin...

BACKGROUND Efficient laboratory service is the cornerstone of modern health care systems. Scientific innovations have contributed to substantial improvements in the field of laboratory science, but errors still prevail. These errors are classified as preanalytical, analytical and postanalytical, depending upon the time of presentation. METHODS The data for 67,438 routine venous blood specimen...

INTRODUCTION Studies about vitamin D [25(OH)D] stability in plasma are limited and preanalytical variables such as tube type may affect results. We aimed to evaluate effect of storage conditions, sample type and some preanalytical variables on vitamin D concentration. MATERIALS AND METHODS Blood samples from 15 healthy subjects were centrifuged at different temperatures and stored under diffe...