An innovative method for determining lipemia interference in blood specimens.
BACKGROUND
Lipemia interference in blood samples is usually determined by adding exogenous substances that cause turbidity or by using ultracentrifugation to clarify the sample. However, there are a number of problems associated with these methods, which make it difficult to ascertain with certainty that lipemia is the cause of interference. We assessed a novel method for evaluating lipemia interference.


METHODS
Lipemic and non-lipemic serum samples, with similar HDL cholesterol concentrations, were mixed in various proportions (5 concentrations) and assayed for HDL and triglycerides. Thus, matched HDL samples with increasing triglycerides concentrations were tested. We then calculated the percent recovery for HDL for each mixture.


RESULTS
Six matched sets of samples had HDL recoveries ranging from 95.9% to 101.1% (n=6 sets, 5 concentrations per set, total of 30 concentrations), with HDL concentrations ranging from 0.78 to 2.16 mmol/l. Triglycerides concentrations in these samples ranged from 1.06 to 9.78 mmol/l for the 30 concentrations.


CONCLUSIONS
We determined that there was no triglycerides interference on the HDL method performed on the Hitachi S40 Clinical Analyzer up to a triglycerides concentration of 9.78 mmol/l. This matching method is simple to perform and proved useful in evaluating interference due to lipemia.
Alfa Wassermann Diagnostic Technologies, West Caldwell, NJ, USA. mrosenthal@awdt.us
Murray A
MA
Rosenthal
Hyman B
HB
Katz
D008076:Cholesterol, HDL / Q000097:blood; D006801:Humans; D006949:Hyperlipidemias / Q000097:blood*; D014280:Triglycerides / Q000097:blood
D008076:Cholesterol, HDL; D014280:Triglycerides