Field-testing and validation in a primary care setting of a point-of-care test for C-reactive protein

BACKGROUND: Use of point-of-care testing (POCT) in primary care has increased. There is a need for high-quality field evaluation of POCT before deployment can be considered. METHOD: A POCT system for C-reactive protein was evaluated in a routine general practice setting. The standard laboratory method was a dry slide method based in a routine hospital laboratory. RESULTS: Scatterplots for both venous and capillary blood POCT system results versus the standard laboratory assay produced correlation coefficients of greater than 0.96. Bland-Altman plots indicated that 95% of venous and capillary POCT results fell within +/-10 mg/L of the mean value with no clinically significant difference from laboratory results. CONCLUSIONS: The POCT system performed reliably in a routine general practice setting with satisfactory performance against an accepted laboratory method.