Point of care testing (POCT) which is also known as bedside testing is the medical diagnostic testing near the patient site which usually involves blood and urine testing. They are very beneficial as they provide accurate result in small period of time. These tests can be performed by paramedics, doctors, radiologists, nurses and other healthcare professionals. There are some self- tests that can be performed by anyone. American Association for Clinical Chemistry (AACC) in 2018 launched a new certification program for point of care testing professionals, and other healthcare experts so that they can perform testing outside the laboratory. Today large numbers of tests are available in POCT formats that too without the requirement of any expertise in the medical technology. With the advancement in biosensors, assay formats, microfluidic, lab-on-a-chip technologies, bioanalytical platforms, and complementary technologies the point of care testing is expanding tremendously. Access Full Report at https://databridgemarketresearch.com/reports/point-care-testing-poct-market Development of smaller and wireless devices is helping the patient to play bigger role in their healthcare provision. Devices like blood glucose monitoring, lipid analysis; urine dipsticks etc. are helping them analyze their body condition. In recent years POCT has shown a measurable improvement with workflow efficiency and significant financial benefit. It makes the life of the patient easier as they don’t have to travel from one place to another for lab tests. The biggest advantage of POCT is speed. For example: If a person is diagnosed with heart attack, they need to be treated quickly and this is done by serum cardiac marker Troponin. If the value is positive, then according to that the patient is treated. POCT help the clinicians to provide effective and quality patient care. Many systems are designed with features that can help the hospitals to manage their POC testing programs. Recently, to improve the entire point of care testing system, Clinical Design has launched a digital point of care urine test at Arab Health 2019. These systems have automatically- timed reading and ability to save digital results directly into the patients electronic health records. Its single- cap contains reagents pads that can test ten different parameters like leukocytes, nitrite, urobilinogen, protein, pH, blood, specific gravity, ketone, bilirubin and glucose. This system has improved the entire process from receiving and recording results. Point of care is very good for the early detection of many serious problems like preeclampsia which is a hypertensive disorder that can create a complication during pregnancy and can create problems for both the mother and the baby. So, Diabetomics in 2019, announced the launch of their point of care test Lumella which will provide accurate and reliable estimate of Glycosylated Fibronectin- a protein which is their in the pregnant women body with the high risk of Preeclampsia. Like home pregnancy test kit, they uses a simple test strip and a hand- held quantitative reader. According to World Health Organization (WHO), 108 million people had diabetes worldwide in 1980 which was increased to 400 million in 2018 and it is estimated that the number is going to increase in the upcoming years. POC has revolutionized the diabetic care. New technologies and development are taking place in market to help the diabetic patient to monitor their blood glucose level. In 2018, Abbott announced the launch of Afinion 2 analyzer which is a small rapid, multi assay platform that provides accurate measurement of hemoglobin A1C and albumin to creatinine ratio. This will allow the people with diabetes to get the HbA1c to get the results within 3 minutes and allow them to get more time for consultation in just one visit. One of the serious public health challenges is HIV virus that causes AIDS. According to UNAIDS, in 2017 36.9 million people worldwide were living with HIV/AIDS out of which 1.8 million were children. It was also estimated that in the same year newly infected were 5000 per day. Testing is one of the most important parts in the HIV as without testing it is impossible to detect the virus. The POCT technology helps the people to detect them easily and start treatment immediately. Abbott in 2018 launched the m- PIMA HIV- 1/2 VL which will provide fast, accurate and easy to use test to manage HIV. It will provide result in less than 70 minutes. Recently, there has been a more focused approach taken by the major manufacturers on the development of point of care testing for convenience in diagnosis and treatment of different diseases. Even though, this approach is expected to bear positive results in the short-term for point-of-care testing, the need for increasing its efficiency and effectiveness should not be ignored.
