Impact of Pneumatic Tube System Transport of Whole Blood Samples on Free DNA Concentration in Human Plasma

[摘要] To the Editor:During the last decade the interest in using circulating cell-free DNA (ccfDNA)1 as a biomarker for the early diagnosis, prognosis, and monitoring of a variety of clinical conditions has increased rapidly. In daily clinical practice, it has been shown that preanalytical variables such as blood sampling, handling-procedurevariations, and blood storage conditions affect the ccfDNA concentration in human plasma (1). In this respect, optimal handling of blood samples between venipuncture and plasma preparation may be considered essential for downstream processes (1, 2) since time delay and/or agitation could trigger the release of genomic DNA from white blood cells (1).To reduce laboratory turnaround time, sample transport by pneumatic tube systems (PTS) has been established in many hospitals. However, rapid accelerations and decelerations during the PTS transport may cause shear stress and can potentially affect various laboratory measurements for coagulation, clinical chemistry, hematology, or blood gas analyses (3).At present, the literature lacks studies investigating the impact of PTS transport on quantitative ccfDNA measurements. Therefore, we compared ccfDNA plasma concentrations between paired whole …

[学科分类] 过敏症与临床免疫学