Issue

The SARS-CoV-2 pandemic in America has led to testing shortages, overburdened commercial labs, and slow turnaround times on results. To remedy the supply issue, federal entities, states, and manufacturers have been strategizing on rapid point-of-care (POC) antigen tests, assays that deliver quicker but perhaps less accurate results than traditional reverse…

The American Cancer Society (ACS) in new guidance enhances the role of human papillomavirus (HPV) testing and changes the age limit for starting cervical cancer screenings. Dispensing with cotesting as the preferred screening method, this new guideline recommends HPV testing alone in women ages 25-65, calling for a phaseout of…

Resistant pathogens in meningococcal disease raise alarms at a time when health experts continue to grapple with the SARS-CoV-2 pandemic. The discovery of possibly the first case of resistant bacterial meningitis in a 5-month-old patient has since led to further investigations and a federal health advisory on antibiotic-resistant Neisseria meningitidis…

Nonintoxicating cannabinoid cannabidiol (CBD) has caught the public eye as a natural remedy for various medical conditions. Consequently, unregulated CBD products that contain unknown, trace quantities of D9-tetrahydrocannabinol (THC) have proliferated, creating new challenges for labs that conduct drug testing.

Patient-based real-time quality control (PBRTQC) has many uses in a laboratorian’s toolbox. It can help with external quality assessment and postmarket surveillance of in vitro diagnostics. PBRTQC’s customized approach also allows it to detect bias changes with great sensitivity, and it’s not expensive to set up. However, for PBRTQC to…

The American Heart Association offers new guidance on interpreting and acting on genetic results for inherited cardiovascular diseases—adding a caveat that variants of uncertain significance (VUS) continue to pose challenges for physicians and genetic testing labs. Any discovery of a pathogenic or likely pathogenic variant should lead to familial cascade…