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>I'm starting to think that it's impossible to get an accurate blood work from a finger prick only. It is possible, but just for certain test types and error r
by danieltillett 11y ago
>I'm starting to think that it's impossible to get an accurate blood work from a finger prick only.
It is possible, but just for certain test types and error rates. The basic problem is the blood drawn from a finger prick is affected by exactly where it goes in and how much skin tissue is picked up. This variability gets averaged out with a large venous draw and so is not quite as bad - there is still a large variability with even normal blood tests for certain test types.
The tests that work OK are things where you just want a yes/no answer (do you have HSV1) and very poorly for things where you are wanting to measuring exact levels of something.
None of this is new to the industry.
- raverbashing 11y agoI wonder if they can detect the level of known impurities and correct for that. If the issue is skin contamination, measure the level of some substance that is correlated with that contamination, then apply a correction factor
- danieltillett 11y agoI assume that is what they hoped to do. Lots of people with decades of experience in this area have tried to do this before without too much success. This doesn't mean it is impossible, but if you are claiming to be able do something that everybody else has tried and failed then your data needs to be impeccable. No hiding behind trade secrets and saying trust us.