Point-of-Care Testing: The Good, the Bad, and the Laboratory Oversight

Point-of-care testing (POCT) is a rapidly expanding area of laboratory medicine. POCT is near-patient testing that is performed near or at the site of a patient, with the result leading to possible change in the care of the patient (1). There are many advantages to POCT, but there are also many challenges, which can jeopardize the quality of the test results. POCT unquestionably has faster turnaround time for results compared with testing sent to a central laboratory. No transport time is required—transport time adds to turnaround time regardless of whether the central laboratory is on-site or the specimens are sent to an outside laboratory. The person ordering the test can be the same person who performs the test, eliminating delays making orders and collecting specimens. The volume of specimen required for POCT is generally much smaller than that required for traditional laboratory tests, and less volume...