[Results with the Clinicard analyser in a paediatric hospital (author's transl)]

The most important chemical pathological investigations which require to be undertaken in the emergency laboratory of a paediatric hospital are of the serum electrolytes, blood glucose, cerebrospinal fluid glucose, blood urea nitrogen, total proteins, bilirubin and calcium. It is imperative to have the opportunity of controlling these parameters both during the day and night. In order to be independent of the presence of a technician we were interested in finding an instrument which can be used by untrained personnel and gives results of sufficient accuracy. Hence, the clinicard analyser was tested in regard to reproducibility and accuracy of results when used by highly-trained technicians and by persons without knowledge of laboratory work. It was established that the values obtained by these two groups are similar and sufficiently reproducible for emergency use. The accuracy of the instrument was tested with 2 charges of cuvettes and with different control sera. In the case of total proteins differences were found between the different control sera used. The values obtained for blood urea nitrogen and for blood glucose lay within the range given for Labtrol and for Seronorm. The accuracy of bilirubin was tested with 5 different control sera and all values lay within the ranged given by the factory. Calcium was tested with Labtrol and Fluinorm and also with sera and urines from different patients. The values were within the range given for the test sera and were comparable to those measured with the calcium analyser of EEL, but were about 7% lower than those determined using atomic absorption. The values obtained for cerebrospinal fluid glucose correlated well with those obtained by the routine method.