Diagnostic Value of Salivary Markers in Neuropsychiatric Disorders
Kułak-Bejda et al.
The finding, in our words
This review summarises the use of saliva as a non-invasive diagnostic fluid for systemic diseases, toxicology, therapeutic drug monitoring and neuropsychiatric disorders. It concludes that the ease of self-collection makes saliva particularly suitable for psychiatric patients who may struggle to cooperate with venous sampling.
A paraphrase to the Library’s standard, never the abstract. The source is one link away and is always the authority.
Saliva is a validated diagnostic matrix for steroids, hormones, therapeutic drugs and drugs of abuse that can be collected non-invasively by patients at home. The review stresses that rigorous collection, handling and storage protocols are critical to prevent false results in decentralised settings.
This study found that salivary 11-dehydrodexamethasone correlates strongly with serum dexamethasone, unlike salivary dexamethasone which shows poor agreement. This validation suggests patients could self-collect saliva samples at home to verify dexamethasone absorption for the overnight suppression test.
In 104 healthy adults who collected both 24-hour urine and saliva at home, salivary iodine concentration measured at specific post-meal intervals showed excellent correlation with urinary iodine excretion. This suggests timed saliva microsampling could replace cumbersome urine collection as a reliable biomarker for assessing iodine intake in decentralised diagnostics.
The paper summarises that volumetric finger-prick self-sampling is suitable for monitoring immunosuppressants and biomarkers after kidney transplantation, but successful implementation requires careful design of the entire workflow, including patient training and method validation. This matters because it provides a real-world framework for moving critical monitoring from the clinic to the patient's home.
Researchers developed an assay to quantify seven cannabinoids and metabolites from 20 µL oral fluid self-collected via a VAMS device, achieving a limit of quantitation of 0.5 ng/mL. In six cannabis consumers, the method successfully quantified Δ9-tetrahydrocannabinol up to 6236 ng/mL, demonstrating the feasibility of low-volume volumetric microsampling for non-invasive toxicology and roadside testing.