Applications of Volumetric Absorptive Microsampling Technique: A Systematic Critical Review
Dodeja et al.
The finding, in our words
Volumetric absorptive microsampling improves precision over dried blood spots by collecting a standardised blood volume, making it suitable for pharmacokinetic studies in special populations, though each assay requires clinical validation before routine use.
A paraphrase to the Library’s standard, never the abstract. The source is one link away and is always the authority.
This review found that volumetric microsampling devices, such as Mitra, HemaPEN, HemaXis DB10, and Tasso-M20, overcome haematocrit bias, whilst Telimmune plasma separation cards enable direct plasma collection without centrifugation. These technologies support patient-centric, decentralised sampling, though the authors note that clinical validation remains limited across different drugs and patient populations.
Huhn & Scherf-Clavel, Therapeutic drug monitoring (paywalled) · source ↗
This method validation for 15 cardiovascular drugs found that VAMS and Capitainer-B provided interchangeable patient results, although Capitainer-B showed higher matrix effects while VAMS exhibited stability losses for specific analytes after two weeks. The work confirms the suitability of these microsampling workflows for decentralised adherence monitoring but highlights the need for analyte-specific stability testing.
The study compared quantitative dried blood spot (qDBS) and volumetric absorptive microsampling (VAMS) devices for measuring ganciclovir levels in capillary blood from pediatric renal transplant recipients. This comparison provides evidence for choosing between microsampling devices in therapeutic drug monitoring, supporting decentralised sampling approaches that reduce patient burden while maintaining analytical accuracy.
Kocur et al., European journal of pharmaceutical sciences : official journal of the European Federation for Pharmaceutical Sciences (paywalled) · source ↗
This study established conversion methods for estimating plasma concentrations from whole blood VAMS samples for seven out of ten oral anticancer drugs, finding good agreement between capillary and venous samples. Patients reported a positive experience with home sampling using this microsampling technique.
Meertens et al., Therapeutic drug monitoring · source ↗
Volumetric absorptive microsampling with Mitra devices permits minimally invasive, finger-prick blood collection for therapeutic drug monitoring of antiseizure medications without trained staff. The review concluded that stability, accuracy and precision are acceptable for specific drugs and haematocrit effects are minimised, but evidence is drug-specific and further validation is required for decentralised clinical use.