Medical Laboratory and Biomedical Science: Vitamin D Standardization

Thursday, August 15, 2013

Vitamin D Standardization

In the past decade, interest in the steroid hormone vitamin D has soared as researchers have uncovered links between vitamin D and conditions such as heart disease, diabetes, rheumatoid arthritis, multiple sclerosis, Parkinson’s disease, and some cancers.
Not surprisingly, in vitro diagnostic manufacturers responded by introducing a number of new immunoassays for measuring 25-hydroxyvitamin D. Such assays offer laboratories a means to automate testing in order to meet the increased demand. Laboratories also have developed their own methods, such as liquid chromatography coupled to tandem mass spectrometry (LC-MS/MS), to measure vitamin D.

However, as test results accumulated, clinical laboratory professionals observed that vitamin D assays from different commercial sources and platforms produced inconsistent results from the same patient specimen. In some instances, these differences were large enough to affect whether a patient would be classified as having sufficient or deficient vitamin D levels.

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Vitamin D Standardization