Compact point-of-care immunoassay analysers such as Radiometer’s AQT90 FLEX provide the clinician with a rapid, cost-effective means of determining critical biomarkers, for example Ddimer, and are valuable diagnostic tools for ruling out venous thromboembolism.
Recent news reports (here and here) have estimated that 25,000 people die annually as a result of venous thromboembolism (VTE), yet many of these deaths are avoidable; upwards of 10,000 lives could be saved if all patients were screened on admission to hospital.
Current guidelines require VTE risk assessments to be performed on 90% of patients admitted to hospital, but only a small proportion of the UK’s 159 trusts are meeting this target. With the NHS facing ever increasing compensation payments - £112 million over the past five years alone - to patients suffering from avoidable or undiagnosed blood clots, VTE screening is essential from both healthcare and financial perspectives.
Under normal physiological conditions, a balance is maintained between coagulation and fibrinolytic processes. During coagulation, an insoluble fibrin network stabilized by covalent cross-links is formed, causing a thrombus. Fibrinolysis breaks down this cross-linked fibrin to an end-stage degradation product, D-dimer. Under pathological conditions, a thrombus may escape the normal fibrinolytic system to grow and propagate.
D-dimer levels, which are known to increase one hour after thrombus, are a specific marker of the breakdown of a fibrin clot and an indirect marker of fibrin formation, enabling D-dimer to be used as an early, sensitive marker for thrombotic disorders. Although not a specific disease marker, high levels of D-dimer can be observed in a variety of conditions, making D-dimer testing a valuable tool in the exclusion of thrombosis. Patients with negative D-dimer test results are unlikely to have an acute condition or disease causing abnormal clot formation and are therefore at very low risk of VTE.
The introduction of point-of-care (POC) devices capable of performing bedside D-dimer analysis has facilitated convenient, rapid and reliable testing, improving turnaround times in comparison to the classical enzyme-linked immunosorbent assays (ELISAs). Radiometer’s AQT90 FLEX uses a time-resolved, fluorescence-based test for quantification of D-dimer in whole blood or plasma, providing rapid, accurate D-dimer measurements in less than 20 minutes to assist the clinician in ruling out the presence of a thrombus and meeting VTE risk assessment goals. No sample preparation is required, and, as a closed tube system, the risk of users coming into contact with blood or waste products is eliminated.
Overall, rapid, point-of-care testing saves time and reduces costs by improving patient flow and decreasing the number of unnecessary procedures requested. The benefit of the system was summarised by Esa Rintakorpi, Clinical Nurse Lead at Buckinghamshire Healthcare NHS Trust, who said: “Our AQT90 has absolutely highlighted the need for good processes within the hospital.”
To find out more, please contact sales@radiometer.co.uk or visit the AQT90 FLEX website.
