title: Automated dried blood spots standard and QC sample preparation using a robotic liquid handler.
abstract: BACKGROUND
  A dried blood spot (DBS) bioanalysis assay involves many steps, such as the preparation of standard (STD) and QC samples in blood, the spotting onto DBS cards, and the cutting-out of the spots. These steps are labor intensive and time consuming if done manually, which, therefore, makes automation very desirable in DBS bioanalysis.
  
  
  RESULTS
  A robotic liquid handler was successfully applied to the preparation of STD and QC samples in blood and to spot the blood samples onto DBS cards using buspirone as the model compound. This automated preparation was demonstrated to be accurate and consistent. However the accuracy and precision of automated preparation were similar to those from manual preparation. The effect of spotting volume on accuracy was evaluated and a trend of increasing concentrations of buspirone with increasing spotting volumes was observed.
  
  
  CONCLUSIONS
  The automated STD and QC sample preparation process significantly improved the efficiency, robustness and safety of DBS bioanalysis.
authors.affiliation: Bioanalytical Sciences, Bristol-Myers Squibb, Route 206 & Province Line Road, Princeton, NJ 08543, USA. long.yuan@bms.com
authors.forename: Long
authors.initials: L
authors.lastname: Yuan
authors.forename: Duxi
authors.initials: D
authors.lastname: Zhang
authors.forename: Anne-Francoise
authors.initials: AF
authors.lastname: Aubry
authors.forename: Mark E
authors.initials: ME
authors.lastname: Arnold
mesh_terms: D000818:Animals; D014151:Anti-Anxiety Agents / Q000097:blood / Q000592:standards; D001331:Automation; D002065:Buspirone / Q000097:blood / Q000592:standards; D002851:Chromatography, High Pressure Liquid; D059788:Dried Blood Spot Testing / Q000295:instrumentation* / Q000592:standards*; D006801:Humans; D011786:Quality Control; D011817:Rabbits; D012371:Robotics; D053719:Tandem Mass Spectrometry
chemical_list: D014151:Anti-Anxiety Agents; D002065:Buspirone