Trends In Clinical Practice: Growth Of POCT

Point-of-Care Testing (POCT) is most frequently defined as "clinical laboratory testing conducted close to the site of patient care, typically by clinical personnel whose primary training is not in the clinical laboratory sciences. POCT refers to any testing performed outside of the traditional, core or central laboratory." According to this definition, there are many synonyms for this form of testing including; ancillary testing, satellite testing, bedside testing and near patient testing. POCT is an increasingly popular means of delivering test results traditionally obtained from a laboratory. When used appropriately, POCT can improve patient outcome by providing a faster diagnostic result and a shorter timeframe to therapeutic intervention.

Within the laboratory environment, turn-around time (TAT) is measured from the time of specimen receipt in the laboratory to the time that the results are posted for clinician review. Clinicians define TAT as time from requesting that a test is performed to the time the clinician receives the result. The differences between these TAT definitions can be highly significant. For laboratory testing, when a test is requested by the treating clinician a sample must be drawn, transported to the laboratory, processed, the result reviewed and then posted for clinician review. In practice, this process can add more than an hour to the internal laboratory TAT. For POCT, the test request can be acted upon immediately by drawing the sample, performing the test, and delivering the result.