2023 · Colorectal disease : the official journal of the Association of Coloproctology of Great Britain and Ireland · paywalled
Reliable capillary sampling of carcinoembryonic antigen at home: the CASA feasibility study
Voigt et al.
The finding, in our words
Capillary blood in Hem-Col microtubes showed a relative bias of 1.23% against directly processed venous sampling for CEA, with samples remaining stable for up to four days after withdrawal. Home-based CEA monitoring for colorectal cancer follow-up is feasible with this method, though underfilled tubes flagged by high lithium concentrations yield less reliable results.
A paraphrase to the Library’s standard, never the abstract. The source is one link away and is always the authority.
This UK consensus opinion outlines how clinical laboratories can validate self-collected capillary blood sampling against venous reference standards to achieve accreditation and facilitate the shift towards community-based patient care.
Capillary blood samples collected by staff or self-collected by participants showed strong correlation and clinically acceptable agreement with venipuncture for influenza haemagglutination inhibition titers. The small differences observed were not clinically meaningful, and adequate sample volume was achieved in most attempts, supporting the feasibility of decentralised serological testing.
Self-collected capillary blood samples posted by standard mail showed high concordance with couriered venous samples for HbA1c, creatinine and lipid parameters, supporting their use for remote monitoring in diabetes management and screening.
Although most kidney transplant recipients successfully collected capillary blood samples at home, haemolysis and transport conditions affected analyte stability. Agreement with venous sampling was acceptable for haemoglobin and creatinine, but potassium and haematocrit exceeded total allowable error limits.
In a cohort of 62 participants evaluating home self-collection with the TassoPlus device, 38 returned samples, with 29% excluded due to insufficient plasma volume below 200 ΔL. Although viral load measurements in adequate samples correlated well with conventional testing (r = 0.800), the high failure rate and missed detection in low-volume viremic samples indicate that further technical refinements are necessary before clinical adoption.