Pediatric Reference Intervals for Critical Point-of-Care Whole Blood Assays in the CALIPER Cohort of Healthy Children and Adolescents

Objectives Point-of-care testing (POCT) is being increasingly adopted to support clinical care. Data for critical care parameters in healthy children on POCT instruments are lacking. We established comprehensive reference standards for several whole blood parameters on the Radiometer ABL90 FLEX PLUS blood gas analyzer in the Canadian Laboratory Initiative on Paediatric Reference Intervals (CALIPER) cohort. Methods Approximately 300 healthy children and adolescents (age range, birth to Results Of the parameters assessed, 6 required age partitioning; none required sex partitioning. Reference value distributions were consistent across the pediatric age range, demonstrating higher variation in the early neonatal period. Conclusions This study established reference standards for 10 critical care analytes in the CALIPER cohort for the first time. These data contribute to our understanding of normative pediatric values for venous electrolytes, metabolites, and blood gases on a modern POCT instrument, facilitating test interpretation in clinical settings that use these assays.