Quantitative comparison of whole blood, plasma and serum metabolomes across different blood collection methods

Plasma lipidomes from self-collected upper-arm capillary blood were statistically indistinguishable from paired venous plasma, most classes at r=0.95–0.99, validating at-home capillary self-collection for lipidomics.

Comparison of capillary and venous plasma lipidomes: validation of self-collected blood for plasma lipidomics — Hameed et al., J. Lipid Research · source ↗

• venous-agreement
• blood
• metabolome
• self-collection
• capillary
• liquid
• validation
• biomarkers

This study found that dried blood microsamples, particularly those collected with the Mitra device, provided metabolic profiles comparable or superior to conventional plasma, supporting their use as a viable alternative for untargeted metabolomics.

Toward minimally invasive metabolomics: GC-MS metabolic fingerprints of dried blood microsamples in comparison to plasma — Marques de Sá E Silva et al., The Analyst (paywalled) · source ↗

• vams
• venous-agreement
• neoteryx-mitra
• blood
• dbs
• metabolome
• dried
• capillary
• validation

Capillary blood collection using volumetric absorptive microsampling demonstrated equivalent quantification of principal colonic polyphenol metabolites compared with matched venous plasma across a six-hour period following barley biscuit consumption. The technique successfully captured the pharmacokinetic profiles over 48 hours, confirming VAMS as a reliable alternative to venepuncture for dietary biomarker monitoring.

Finger-prick blood sampling using volumetric absorptive microsampling (VAMS) method for monitoring the main (poly)phenolic metabolites in human blood after barley biscuit intake — Cortijo-Alfonso et al., Journal of chromatography. B, Analytical technologies in the biomedical and life sciences (paywalled) · source ↗

• vams
• venous-agreement
• neoteryx-mitra
• blood
• metabolome
• dried
• capillary
• validation
• biomarkers

Capillary VAMS blood covered more of the metabolome than plasma, capturing intracellular red-cell metabolites, and correlated moderately-to-well with venous, Spearman 0.66; the honest caveats are higher finger-prick replicate variability and a need for −80 °C storage within six hours.

VAMS-based blood capillary sampling for mass-spectrometry-based human metabolomics studies — Volani et al., Metabolites · source ↗

• vams
• venous-agreement
• blood
• metabolome
• dried
• capillary
• validation
• biomarkers

This review highlights how low-volume, minimally invasive microsampling of matrices such as dried capillary blood, interstitial fluid and saliva can enable untargeted metabolomics and longitudinal exposome studies in children, with the potential for home self-collection to improve convenience and parental support.

Minimally Invasive Biospecimen Collection for Exposome Research in Children's Health — Petrick et al., Current environmental health reports (paywalled) · source ↗

• blood
• saliva
• interstitial-fluid
• dried
• capillary
• self-collection
• validation
• venous-agreement
• pediatric
• metabolome