Since 2009, as part of diagnostic and antimicrobial stewardship strategies, Hampshire Hospitals National Health Service (NHS) Trust has used serum procalcitonin (PCT) – an innovative and highly specific marker to diagnose clinically relevant bacterial infections and sepsis. Report: Mark Nicholls
Bringing liquid chromatography and tandem mass spectrometry (LC-MS/MS) testing into clinical laboratories has been a slow process but continues to show promise to help improve patient care. The medical device industry is on the edge of fundamental breakthroughs that can help drive the adoption into more mainstream clinical laboratories. We recently sat down with Dr Bori Shushan, Mass Spectrometry…
When trialled in Swansea, Wales, Matrix Assisted Laser Desorption Ionisation – Time of Flight (MALDI-TOF) demonstrated sufficient advantages over conventional methods to be introduced into routine practice.
Scientists in the UK have designed a new self-assembling nanoparticle that targets tumours and could lead to quicker diagnosis of cancer. Researchers at Imperial College London report that a new self-assembling nanoparticle can adhere to cancer cells, thus making them visible in MRI scans and possibly eliminate the need for invasive tissue biopsies. Report: Mark Nicholls
Looking back, the founding fathers of laboratory medicine were doctors who carried out the historic medical practice of uroscopy in the Middle Ages, explains Professor Klaus Kohse MD, Director of the Institute for Laboratory Medicine in Oldenburg Clinical Centre at Oldenburg University Medical Faculty. Report: Walter Depner
They are not such strange bedfellows, say Walter Depner (Frankfurt) and Professor Norbert Gässler (Hildesheim), who find themselves ‘kissed by the European lab muse’ and were prompted to ask: What links literature and laboratory medicine at a European level? Commentary: Walter Depner, Prof. Norbert Gässler
Managing physicians’ test requests is a key ingredient of modern lab management. However, doctors and nurses still do not provide the clinical reasons for orders to all labs.
‘All human body cells contain the same DNA, but every type of cell – for example a muscle cell compared to that of a nerve – has a different gene expression pattern’, said Dr Sonja Stadler, speaking at the 2012 congress of DGKL (German Society for Clinical Chemistry).
‘Mass spectrometry has developed into a successful routine procedure,’ according to Dr Christoph Seger (Univ. Doz.), technical head of the Mass Spectrometry and Chromatography division at the Central Institute of Medical and Chemical Laboratory Diagnostics, Innsbruck University Hospital, Austria.
The Poole Hospital NHS Foundation Trust has become the first site, worldwide, to evaluate the full serum work area (SWA) capabilities of the cobas 8000 high throughput clinical analyser.
Clinical chemistry has evolved far beyond its beginnings of blood and urine analysis. Advanced techniques such as enzyme measurement, electrophoresis, and immunoassays have made their impact on the field, expanding its diagnostic capabilities. Keep reading for advances in automation and clinical chemistry applications for toxicology, urinalysis and much more.
The medical laboratory is a supporting pillar of modern healthcare. Laboratory findings with analyses of blood, urine and other body fluids provide valuable insights from infection diagnostics and innovative screening procedures to therapy monitoring. Here you will find information on sample management, pre- and postanalytics, clinical chemistry, haematology and much more.