[Guidelines for the point-of-care testing post-examination phase management]

Abstract

For point-of-care-testing (POCT), the French regulation on medical biology states allows a unique situation where a delayed validation of results is possible. This paper proposes guidelines to organize POCT post-analytical phase in agreement with the local regulation and ISO 22870 requirements. In the first part, organization of POCT validation is detailed (since analysis results reading by the physician until validation of results by the medical biologist and their integration into the patient record). In a second part, elements to include in POCT presentation of results are discussed and a model is proposed.