Point-of-care testing performed by healthcare professionals outside the hospital setting: consensus based recommendations from the IFCC Committee on Point-of-Care Testing (IFCC C-POCT).

The International Federation of Clinical Chemistry and Laboratory Medicine (IFCC) Committee on Point-of-Care Testing (C-POCT) supports the use of point-of-care testing (POCT) outside of the hospital setting performed by healthcare professionals without formal laboratory education because of its numerous benefits. However, these benefits are associated with risks that must be managed, to ensure the provision of reliable test results and minimize harm to the patient. Healthcare professionals, local regulatory bodies, accredited laboratories as well as manufacturers should actively be engaged in education, oversight and advice to ensure that the healthcare professional selects the appropriate equipment and is able to analyze, troubleshoot and correctly interpret the point-of-care (POC) test results.

Effect of the statin therapy on biochemical laboratory tests--a chemometrics study.

Statins are the first-line choice for lowering total and LDL cholesterol levels and very important medicaments for reducing the risk of coronary artery disease. The aim of this study is therefore assessment of the results of biochemical tests characterizing the condition of 172 patients before and after administration of statins. For this purpose, several chemometric tools, namely principal component analysis, cluster analysis, discriminant analysis, logistic regression, KNN classification, ROC analysis, descriptive statistics and ANOVA were used. Mutual relations of 11 biochemical laboratory tests, the patient's age and gender were investigated in detail. Achieved results enable to evaluate the extent of the statin treatment in each individual case. They may also help in monitoring the dynamic progression of the disease.