Acceptability of dried blood spot collection by primary caregivers of Filipino patients with maple syrup urine disease (MSUD) and phenylketonuria (PKU)
Merencilla et al.
The finding, in our words
Primary caregivers of children with metabolic disorders found at-home dried blood spot collection acceptable after training, which could enable more timely and cost-effective monitoring. This supports the feasibility of decentralised, patient-centric sampling for long-term condition management.
A paraphrase to the Library’s standard, never the abstract. The source is one link away and is always the authority.
A 2025 review maps 28 microsampling devices, from dried spots and volumetric absorptive tips to upper-arm liquid capillary collectors, and names what a laboratory must control before their results are used: the haematocrit effect in non-volumetric dried samples, interstitial fluid from finger milking, volume, haemolysis and transport stability. Regulators on both sides of the Atlantic ask for the same two things, a device the patient can use safely and a sample fit for the test.
Dried blood spot sampling matched venous serum performance for islet autoantibody detection and was considered minimally invasive and convenient by parents and stakeholders, supporting its use for decentralised screening in home or community settings.
Faustini et al., Diabetic medicine : a journal of the British Diabetic Association · source ↗
This systematic review of 67 studies involving 34,739 kidney disease patients found dried blood microsampling was mainly used for immunosuppressant therapeutic drug monitoring and kidney function assessment. The approach offered cost savings, was preferred by patients for home self-collection, and provides a patient-centric opportunity to upscale longitudinal sampling and reduce participation bias in decentralised kidney disease research.
Lamond et al., Journal of clinical laboratory analysis · source ↗
The study found low SARS-CoV-2 seropositivity in unvaccinated children and young adults in British Columbia, with higher rates in South Asian participants and young infants. Many infections were undetected, highlighting the value of patient-centric microsampling for more accurate, decentralised surveillance.
Silverberg et al., BMC infectious diseases · source ↗
Adolescents collecting blood microsamples at home achieved varying success rates across six devices, with Minicollect tubes performing poorest. The confirmation that visual inspection alone was insufficient, by analytical variability, underscores the need for robust quality assessment before deploying any device in decentralised trials.
Boffel et al., The AAPS journal (paywalled) · source ↗