Abstract
Objective: The frequency of hemolysis of blood samples may be increased by transport in a pneumatic tube system. The purpose of this study was to evaluate the effect of pneumatic tube system transport on hemolysis of blood samples. Methods: Blood samples were transported from the emergency department to the hospital laboratory manually by hospital staff (49 patients) or with a pneumatic tube system (53 patients). The hemolysis index and serum chemistry studies were performed on the blood samples and compared between the different methods of transport. Results: The blood samples that were transported by the pneumatic tube system had a greater frequency of hemolysis and greater mean serum potassium and median creatinine, aspartate aminotransferase, and lactate dehydrogenase levels than samples transported manually. Conclusion: Blood samples transported from the emergency department to the hospital laboratory by a pneumatic tube system may have a greater frequency of hemolysis than samples transported manually. This may necessitate repeat phlebotomy and cause a delay in completing the laboratory analysis.
Highlights
The blood samples that were transported by the pneumatic tube system had a greater frequency of hemolysis and greater mean serum potassium and median creatinine, aspartate aminotransferase, and lactate dehydrogenase than samples transported manually (Table-I)
The present results showed that samples transported by the pneumatic tube system had a markedly greater frequency of hemolysis than samples transported manually (Table-I)
Abnormalities of potassium, magnesium, phosphate, aspartate aminotranferase, and lactate dehydrogenase have been observed previously in blood samples transported by pneumatic tube systems.[7,8,9,10,11]
Summary
Hospital care requires transport of numerous drugs, clinical specimens, medical instruments, radiographs, and laboratory reports between departments. This is costly to hospitals and requires the employment of hospital transportation staff. Blood samples from patients in the emergency department were transported manually by hospital staff from the emergency department to the laboratory. During this time, we observed that laboratory results frequently were normal, including the hemolysis index. We hypothesized that the pneumatic tube system may cause hemolysis of blood samples that may necessitate repeat phlebotomy and cause delays in patient care
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