May 2010
Feature Story

Brendan Dabkowski

As coagulation testing moves closer to the point of care, makers of POC and self-monitoring coagulation testing systems have developed products that make it easier for their users—health care professionals and patient self-testers alike—to track and manage coagulation status.

“Since the end user is typically not laboratory trained, the POC coordinator expects the platform to have as few sources of error as possible,” says David Pearman, Helena Point of Care’s marketing manager of POC and hemostasis products. POC coordinators consider portability, connectivity, and pricing, too. Helena’s latest offering in this market is the Cascade POC system, which, along with its ease of use, features a broad test menu and smart card technology. The company plans to launch later this year a new version of the analyzer with an enhanced user interface and larger test menu.

Another company designing its POC coagulation analyzers with usability in mind is Roche Diagnostics, where Tim Huston, director of marketing, professional diagnostics – physician office laboratory, says the shift to anticoagulation testing at the physician’s office and in the patient’s home should continue to drive advances in the technology and services. Roche continues to offer its CoaguChek XS systems as well as the CoaguChek XS Plus system; the latter has received CLIA-waived status and provides users with new tools and connectivity options to help manage patients on warfarin therapy. The XS Plus can now hold up to 1,000 patient results. It also has a reduced blood-application sample size requirement of 8 µL (from 10 µL), which is available with all CoaguChek systems. Coming this summer is the CoaguChek XS Pro system, which is FDA-cleared and features bar-code scanning and the same data-management functionality as the XS Plus.

In addition to demanding increasingly portable devices that require smaller sample sizes with faster analysis, customers also want more “creature comforts,” says David Phillips, vice president of marketing for hemostasis/thrombosis at HemoSense/Inverness Medical. To this end, the company has added the INRatio 2 PC Connect to its INRatio 2 testing system. It’s a free software program that allows users to directly trans-fer patient test results from the analyzer to a PC.

Still available from International Technidyne is the Hemochron Signature Elite analyzer, a handheld whole blood microcoagulation system that features new com-pliance technology, says Noelle Meirose, product manager, hospital coagulation. The new technology improves safety, security, and compliance and integrates data management and connectivity.

CAP TODAY’s POC and self-monitoring coagulation analyzers product guide includes instruments from the aforementioned companies, as well as Abbott Point of Care, Instrumentation Laboratory, and Medtronic Cardiac Surgery.

Related Links

• Coagulation analyzers—point of care, self-monitoring
  (PDF, 103 KB)