Presampling Factors

Choosing the right kind of samples from human subjects for trace element studies poses many difficult problems. First of all, due to practical considerations, specimens with clinical relevance are restricted to a few such as whole blood, hair, nail, urine, and faeces. Although autopsies provide access to collect various organs, their usefulness is restricted to monitoring type of activities and not for clinical diagnosis. Besides these basic differences one is also confronted with procuring "valid" samples for analysis. Validity refers to both analytical and biological aspects and the material collected should satisfy both the demands to make the specimen meaningful. In practice this is not a simple task because a number of presampling factors need to be taken into account. Significant situations among these are the biological variations, post mortem changes, intrinsic errors resulting from internal contaminations, etc. The impact of these factors alters the status of the sample and calls for adequate discription of the specimen. In the absence of a well defined sample protocol accurate characterization of the material will not be possible and renders the analytical effort worthless. Solutions to these problems should be sought at interdisciplinary level and effective team work is mandatory to make any meaningful progress in our endeavours to answer public health questions.