Additive-Aggravated Assays: An Authoritative Answer

Abstract

Immunoassay interferences are diverse in scope (1)(2)(3)(4)(5)(6)(7)(8) and are the subject of several recent large-scale studies (9, 10 ), opinions, and editorials (6,11 ). Most interferences originate from components of the sample (e.g., human anti

Processing Controls in Blood Collection Tubes Reveals Interference

“…Collection of blood in certain batches of Vacutainer ® SST tubes was associated with errors in some immunoassays on certain immunoassay platforms [e.g., biases of 20% to 30% for total thyroxine (T 4 ), total triiodothyronine (T 3 ), and cortisol and Ϫ15% to 20% for follicle-stimulating hormone (FSH)]. These errors have been attributed to contamination of samples with surfactants that are used to coat the tubes; the surfactant can release reagent antibodies from some solid-phase materials used in immunoassay methods (5,6 ).…”

“…Among the described mutations and polymorphisms (5,6 ), c.103delG accounts for 37% of mutant alleles, allowing diagnosis of PH2 to be made by genetic testing (5 ). One of the polymorphisms, c.579GϾA, occurs in exon 6, and the G allele has been shown to have a frequency of 0.68 in genomic DNA from PH2 patients (5 ).…”