Use of a capillary specimen in the laboratory to verify a point-of-care international normalized ratio: Avoidance of a venipuncture in a pediatric setting.

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Point-of-care (POC) international normalized ratio (INR) values above an institutional cutoff are confirmed in the laboratory using a gold standard venous specimen. This can be problematic in a pediatric setting. In this study, 449 consecutive POC INR results were compared to an INR performed in the laboratory on a capillary citrate specimen collected from the same finger-stick. The results were statistically analyzed. The mean INR values from the CoaguChek XS and laboratory were 2.85±1.19 and 2.63±1.11, respectively. There was a good correlation between the methods with r=0.97. Bland-Altman analysis indicated a bias of 0.22 favoring the CoaguChek XS, with 95% limits of agreement -0.29 to 0.72. Passing and Bablok method comparison resulted in a slope of 0.91 (y=0.91x+0.02). An INR of ≤0.5 was found between the methods in 89% of cases and 84% agreement was noted (κ=0.69). Comparing the capillary INR laboratory results to studies involving a venous specimen, the capillary specimen performed with equivalence. Thus, a capillary citrate specimen can be collected from the same finger-stick used to perform the POC INR for confirmation in the laboratory. This avoids the trauma of a venous collection in such a situation.