OBJECTIVE To compare the simple, swab 'Kudoh method' for culturing Myobacterium tuberculosis from sputum samples, to the standard Petroff digestion-decontamination procedure. The Kudoh method, which requires no centrifugation and takes only 4-5 min per sample, was also evaluated for its performance in a rural setting. METHODS Two hospital laboratories in Caracas, Venezuela processed 314 sputu...

Andrology laboratories need to produce reliable results for appropriate diagnostic and health care decisions. Since semen analysis is highly complex and procedurally difficult to standardize, quality control (QC) is essential to detect and correct systematic errors and high variability of results. The large discrepancies between assessments of sperm concentration and morphology in different lab...

In 1999, 890 000 measurements of thyroid stimulating hormone were performed by Scottish hospital laboratories—approximately one test for every six of Scotland’s 5.1 million people. This number does not include tests performed in the non-NHS laboratories or as part of the screening programme for congenital hypothyroidism. Although laboratory statistics are not collected nationally in England and...

Since the appearance in 1986 of epidemic of bovine spongiform encephalopathy (BSE), a new form of neurological disease in cattle which also affected human beings, many diagnostic and research activities have been performed to develop detection and therapeutic tools. A lot of progress was made in better identifying, understanding and controlling the spread of the disease by appropriate monitorin...

Background: Laboratory wastes are one of the environmental issues of developing countries and cause diseases and epidemics. Laboratory waste management is planned with the aim of preventing unfavorable effects on human health and the environment. The aim of the present study was to determine the status of medical waste management in clinical laboratories affiliated with Rafsanjan University of ...