Prothrombin time tests on a microfluidic disc analyzer

Prothrombin time test is used to measure the time required for blood to coagulate and is essential for monitoring appropriate drug dosing in patients taking oral anti-coagulants. To reduce the costs of reagents and improve the stability of tests, a microfluidic disc analyzer (MDA) has been developed. This analyzer can process small volumes of liquid samples (less than 10 mu l total volume required) and performs effective and fast mixing (within one second) under centrifugation. During the mixing process, two reactants can also maintain a constant ratio of flowrate. One hundred and one clinical samples were tested by the MDA and the Sysmex CA1500 coagulation analyzer, which was frequently used as a reference machine, for comparison. The test results from these two instruments show good correlation and agreement. (c) 2011 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.