Owners of diabetic pets often use a glucometer (a device that measures blood glucose levels) to monitor their pet’s disease. Glucometers will quickly measure blood glucose with a minimal amount of blood. Having ready access to a glucometer is often a matter of life or death for the affected pet. While they are highly convenient, glucometers are not as accurate as other methods.
Researchers from the University of Pennsylvania School of Veterinary Medicine have discovered that blood glucose measurements are much more accurate when blood plasma/serum is used instead of whole blood. Blood plasma/serum may be used with a glucometer. The research article is entitled Correlation between glucose concentrations in serum, plasma, and whole blood measured by a point-of-care glucometer and serum glucose concentration measured by an automated biochemical analyzer for canine and feline blood samples and was published in the Journal of the American Veterinary Medical Association (Volume 246, Number 12). This new discovery may spark some research in human medicine to determine if human blood plasma/serum can be as accurate as a dog or cats.
80 dogs and 65 cats were included in the study. Typically, glucometers determine glucose levels from whole blood however the researchers wanted to determine the glucose levels in blood plasma and blood serum. Blood plasma is the fluid remaining when red and white blood cells have been removed. Blood serum is the fluid remaining from blood plasma once the clotting factors are removed. Both are easily obtained by spinning blood in a centrifuge.
Each sample was testing in a glucometer and in a biochemical analyzer. The biochemical analyzer is the current most accurate machine for testing blood glucose. Blood serum and blood plasma tested in a glucometer provided results that were very similar to those obtained by the biochemical analyzer. Both serum and plasma were more accurate than whole blood.
Senior author, Rebecka Hess said, "It's a simple study, but it has changed the way we do things. It's widely known that glucometer readings come with a degree of inaccuracy, and until now we've just lived with it. With technology becoming cheaper and smaller all of the time, I can easily envision people purchasing centrifuges to use at home for this purpose," Hess said
Ryan Hospital Director of Emergency Services and Chief of Critical Care, Kenneth Drobatz said, "The plasma and serum results were very tightly clumped with the results from the gold standard machine. That gives us a lot of confidence in this method."
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