Search

The need for regular blood-drawing in the management of chronic metabolic disorders may negatively influence the compliance of patients and their parents; noninvasive analytical procedures could well alleviate this burden. Using data obtained in six adult probands with phenylketonuria, we evaluate the feasibility of noninvasive prediction of phenylalanine blood concentrations from analysis of phenylalanine and creatinine in urine. Cross-validated regression equations correct for the significant inter-individual variation of phenylalanine fractional excretion rates. With sensitive and specific enzymatic assays for phenylalanine and creatinine, the accuracy of this noninvasive procedure may also become clinically satisfactory for the purpose of self-monitoring. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The widespread use of different methods for the determination of HDL-cholesterol (in Europe: sodium phosphotungstic acid/MgCl) in connection with enzymatic procedures (in the USA: heparin/MnCl followed by the Liebermann-Burchard method) but common reference values makes it necessary to evaluate not only accuracy, specificity, and precision of the precipitation step but also of the subsequent cholesterol determination. A high ratio of serum vs. concentrated precipitation reagent (10:1 V/V) leads to the formation of variable amounts of Δ-3.5-cholestadiene. This substance is not recognized by cholesterol oxidase but leads to an 1.6 times overestimation by the Liebermann-Burchard method. Therefore, errors in HDL-cholesterol determination should be considered and differences up to 30% may occur between HDL-cholesterol values determined by the different techniques (heparin/MnCl - Liebermann-Burchard and NaPW/MgCl-CHOD-PAP). [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]