Principal Drivers for DBS Research
It is now recognised that regarding a child as a scaled down adult to calculate a medicine dose may not be appropriate.
Principal Drivers for DBS Research
- Regulatory drive and industry acceptance for better paediatric medication. It is now recognised that regarding a child as a scaled down adult to calculate a medicine dose may not be appropriate, leading to possible treatment failure or overdose. Evidence-based studies on the safety and efficacy of medicines in children are therefore required. It is unethical to take a 5-10ml blood sample from a baby with a circulating blood volume of only 250ml, i.e. the volume of a mug of coffee. Therefore, DBS sampling is currently the only way forward.
- Ease of sample collection …
- Regulatory drive and industry acceptance for better paediatric medication. It is now recognised that regarding a child as a scaled down adult to calculate a medicine dose may not be appropriate, leading to possible treatment failure or overdose. Evidence-based studies on the safety and efficacy of medicines in children are therefore required. It is unethical to take a 5-10ml blood sample from a baby with a circulating blood volume of only 250ml, i.e. the volume of a mug of coffee. Therefore, DBS sampling is currently the only way forward.
- Ease of sample collection. In the healthcare sector the sample can be collected via a simple finger or heel prick. Specialists are not required and there is minimum patient discomfort.
- Reduction in the number of animals used in drug discovery experiments by the pharmaceutical industry. The dramatic reduction in the volume of blood needed for an individual measurement has meant that more samples can be taken from a single rodent. Furthermore, better data quality results from the reduced sample variability.
- Reduction in sample transport costs. Current medical trials are multi-centre and multi-ethnic, which implies samples being transported around the world. The ability to maintain sample integrity as a dried spot on a card at room temperature has major cost benefits.
- DBS samples pose less of a biohazard risk to handlers than liquid blood samples.
- DBS is suitable for both preclinical (animal) and clinical (human) samples.
- Benefit of experience with Guthrie cards. Health service providers and regulatory authorities are already familiar with a similar successful methodology in newborn screening and the expansion to other applications should be less problematic.
- Potential for automation. Healthcare service providers are always looking for ways to reduce costs; a patient sample on a fixed shape card provides the optimum sample for automation.
Please read the other articles in this series:
Spot On
Dried Blood Spot 101
Confronting Concerns
Sangeeta Tanna holds a PhD in pharmaceutics in the development of an artificial pancreas. Her expertise and research interests lie in the bioanalysis and drug delivery fields. This has led to the development of micro-analytical methodologies for the determination of therapeutic drugs from dried blood spots (DBS) based on LC-MS and LC-MS/MS studies for a range of clinical applications. This research was awarded the Royal Society of Chemistry Analytical Methods Prize in 2010. Applications of this work to patient care include improved medication for babies and people with cardiovascular diseases.
Graham Lawson’s expertise is instrumental analysis in such disparate areas as environmental exposure in the polymer industry, the identification of migrants from food packaging and factors influencing drug delivery in clinical applications. The unifying themes are the detection of ultra low levels of contamination and the protection of people from adverse exposures. He was co-opted onto a NATO special studies group on the Stand-off detection of radiation. His current research interests include novel analytical techniques applied to blood spot analyses and to counterfeit drug detection.
