Evaluation of BD Barricor™ Plasma Blood Collection Tube for Biochemical Tests.

BACKGROUND: Blood from patients who are receiving anticoagulant therapy may take longer to clot. Anticoagulation is an important component of the dialysis prescription. We compared BD Vacutainer(R) Barricor Plasma Blood Collection Tubes (BD BarrricorTM), BD Vacutainer(R) PST Lithium Heparin Tubes (BD PST), and BD (Becton-Dickinson, Franklin Lakes, NJ, USA) Vacutainer Serum Separator Tubes (BD SST), as reference tube in dialysis patients to examine whether they had an effect on routine biochemical tests. MATERIALS AND METHODS: A total of 29 chronic hemodialysis patients were included in this study. Samples were collected into BD BarrricorTM, BD PST, and BD SST tubes after the dialysis. All the tubes were centrifuged by NF 1200R rotor (1,300 g for 10 minutes at 22 degrees C, 1,200 g for 10 minutes at 4 degrees C, 2,400 g for 10 minutes at 22 degrees C, respectively) after the incubation period. Eleven routine clinical chemistry parameters (Creatinine, Urea, Na, K, Cl, AST, ALT, Total Bilirubin, Direct Bilirubin, Calcium, Cholesterol) were analyzed on a Beckman Coulter AU 5800. RESULTS: Results of creatinine, K and cholesterol were statistically significantly different between the SST and LiH (p = 0.014, p = 0.009, and p < 0.001, respectively). In terms of other biochemical parameters we tested for all three tubes there was no clinically significance inspite of the statistically significance. CONCLUSIONS: BD Barricor tubes provide fast, clean, high-quality plasma samples, safe results, and may lower times and costs.