The Benefit of Using a D-dimer Assay with a High Clinical Specificity
Webinar presented by Karin Strandberg, MD, PhD, Assoc. Prof, Consultant, Labmedicine, Skåne, Sweden
This webinar is scheduled as two sessions to accomodate for participants in different time zones.
November 29, 2016 - 12:00 PM CET (Paris, Berlin, Copenhagen)
Session 1
November 29, 2016 - 4:00 PM CET (Paris, Berlin, Copenhagen)
Session 2
About this webinar
D-dimer can be used to exclude venous thromboembolism (VTE) in
outpatients. Together with a low pretest probability for VTE, a negative
D-dimer can safely rule out VTE in 30-50 % of patients with suspected
VTE.
To date, there is no standardisation of D-dimer tests, which causes variation in results among methods.
This webinar will discuss pitfalls and limitations of the D-dimer
analyte with special focus on the performance differences among methods.
The use of D-dimer requires a method with particular performance characteristics, most importantly:
- A high sensitivity and negative predictive value (NPV) to ensure that patients with VTE are not falsely characterized as ”not sick”
- Acceptable diagnostic specificity to minimize the number of radiological imagings on patients without VTE
- Good reproducibility around the cut-off (decision limit) to ensure reproducibility of whether a result is ”positive” or ”negative”.
A verification of the performance of the assay in the local clinical
population is also recommended, but it is a difficult and time-consuming
task. Publications on comparisons between methods are therefore
sometimes used to support the choice of method and the cut-off.
Besides a sensitivity and negative predictive value (NPV) as close to
100 % as possible, a high specificity is of importance to limit the
number of unnecessary radiological imagings for the benefit of the
patient and to improve logistics and lower the costs of the health care
costs.
Who should attend?
- ED doctors and nurses
- Respiratory doctors
- Lab managers
- POC managers
- Cardiologists
- ICU doctors
- Operation theater doctors and nurses
Continuing education
US participants:
- One PACE® credit will be provided for each session
- Each session is approved for 1 Florida CE credit
Florida Board of Clinical Laboratory Personnel approved number:
50-12563
International participants:
- A Certificate of Attendance will be available for all sessions for international participants to submit to their appropriate accrediting agencies
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