title: Fluid uptake in Schirmer papers and its relevance to their employment in tear collection for lysozyme tests.
abstract: An investigation was undertaken into the relationship between the wet length of a standard Schirmer paper and the fluid weight in the 5 mm tip after a 5-minute moistening period. Immediate weighing after moistening showed that it is unreliable to infer a particular fluid weight in the 5 mm tip from a known wet length, and it is concluded that such papers will lead to error in lysozyme tests. If the papers are inserted for a period within sealed envelopes, there is found to be a close relationship between wet length and fluid weight in the tip, the papers reaching a stable state at 5 hours. Soaked Schirmer papers were shown to given particularly inconsistent results.
mesh_terms: D005374:Filtration / Q000295:instrumentation; D006801:Humans; D009113:Muramidase / Q000032:analysis*; D010209:Paper; D013048:Specimen Handling; D013666:Tears / Q000201:enzymology*; D013997:Time Factors
chemical_list: D009113:Muramidase