I was wondering if anyone here worked for Quest or CPL. I had a question about patient samples. I was under the impressions that they these companies had collection facilities were phlebos drew patient blood and then the blood was sent out to a laboratory site. What kind of processing has to be done to the patient samples if they are going to be sent out? Especially if stuff like PTINR is ordered which is only stable for 4 hours, I am assuming that the plasma must be separated from the cells and frozen.

If you are going to use Quest as a reference lab for send-out testing, they should provide you with a test catalogue that details stuff like specimen processing. 

 

(By the way, i am pretty sure that an PT/INR is going to be stabile for days if the plasma is aliquoted and frozen for shipping)

 

Scott