Clinical Chemistry Podcast

Informatics is changing the processes behind laboratory medicine. With ever-growing demands on laboratory medicine professionals not only to collect and interpret omics data in the era of the Precision Medicine Initiative, but also to ensure high-quality, low-cost patient management in the structure of accountable care organizations, we have invited several experts to discuss their take on "big da...

Combined testing of high-sensitivity cardiac troponin T (hs-cTnT) and copeptin at presentation provides a very high—although still imperfect—negative predictive value (NPV) for the early rule-out of acute myocardial infarction (AMI). We hypothesized that a second copeptin measurement at 1 h might further increase the NPV.

We investigated whether obese pregnant women negative for gestational diabetes (GDM) still experience dysglycemia, as indicated by high glycated hemoglobin (Hb A1c) at delivery, and whether this impacts offspring and long-term maternal outcomes.

STARD 2015: An updated list of essential items for reporting diagnostic accuracy studies

Increased concentrations of non-fasting remnant cholesterol are thought to be atherogenic in thesame way as LDL cholesterol,by transport into andaccumulationof lipid into the arterial wall.

For patients with acute coronary syndrome who have undergone interventions such as placement of a stent, it has become standard practice to treat them with a combination of aspirin and opidogrel to prevent subsequent thrombotic events; however, clopidogrel is a drug that requires activation by a liver enzyme, CYP2C19.

Most of us are familiar with the link between elevated concentrations of lipids in our blood and an increased risk for cardiovascular disease which is responsible for about 500,000 deaths each year in the United States. It has been common practice to measure those lipids only after a period of fasting. This practice was put in place because of the known increases in triglycerides that can occur af...

Microfluidics has attracted a lot of attention across a wide range of disciplines because of the potential for using it to analyze tiny samples and to integrate processes onto handheld Labs-on-a-Chip. So instead of sending vials of blood to a central laboratory and getting results back days later, you can imagine a Microfluidic device that can give you the same performance, but with a finger prick...

Commutability is an important concept in determining traceability and relationship among different methods used to measure the same analyte, but how to delineate commutable materials is not straightforward and a number of techniques have been proposed.

Several studies have suggested that prevention of atherosclerosis should begin in childhood as dyslipidemia in children is associated with severity of atherosclerotic lesions later in life. Pediatric lipid screening aims to identify children and adolescents with dyslipidemia, including both those with more severe genetic cases and those cases with mild to moderate lipid elevation due to secondary...

Advances in clinical laboratory testing have had a profound impact in improving the quality of medical care. Today laboratory diagnostic tests inform physicians and patients of the exact causes of a number of diseases and disorders, including cancer, chronic diseases, infectious diseases, sexually transmitted diseases, and genetic disorders.

In the past decade there has been a rapid increase in the number of individuals who have had their entire genome sequenced. Over the next decade that number will go from the thousands to the millions. These people are having their genomes sequenced for research, recreational interest, and clinical testing.

Vitamin D insufficiency has been widely associated with numerous negative health outcomes, including higher all-cause mortality, although no mechanism has been formally established for such observations.

Clinical trials, epidemiologic and most types of clinical research, include the acquisition of biological samples to be analyzed either immediately after collection, or in the future for biomarkers related to the study hypotheses. Tested biomarkers include those used to monitor subjects' health and to detect harmful side effects or to follow impact of therapeutic interventions.

Biomarkers are playing increasingly important roles in the detection and management of patients with cancer. Despite an enormous number of publications on cancer biomarkers, few of these biomarkers are in widespread clinical use.

Biomarkers are playing increasingly important roles in the detection and management of patients with cancer. Despite an enormous number of publications on cancer biomarkers, few of these biomarkers are in widespread clinical use.

A major objective of the International Federation of Clinical Chemistry and Laboratory Medicine, or IFCC, Task Force on implementation of Hemoglobin A1c Standardization is to develop quality targets with the measurement of Hemoglobin A1c.