Abstract

Background: BNP and NT-proBNP are widely used as rule-out tests for heart failure (HF) and they are frequently requested by primary care doctors. A point-of-care (POC) test would reduce the time to diagnosis for patients with suspected HF. The aim of the study was to evaluate a POC BNP test.
Methods: Plasma BNP results obtained with the Meritas® POC instrument (n = 82) were compared with the corresponding plasma BNP results analyzed on an Advia Centaur analyzer (Siemens Healthcare, Erlangen, Germany).
Results: The two methods showed concordant results with a Passing-Bablok correlation between the two methods: BNPMeritas = 1.00 x BNPSiemens + 1.09; r = 0.9773.
Conclusions: The study show that the Meritas® BNP assay could be used in primary care permitting rapid BNP testing to rule out heart failure.

DOI: 10.7754/Clin.Lab.2014.140815