Laboratory competences Analytical techniques and instrumentation

Details

Title

Laboratory competences Analytical techniques and instrumentation

Type

Stage One

Module code

HLS004

Requirement

Compulsory

Module objective

By the end of the training period trainees will, in respect of the clinical biochemistry laboratory and its clinical interface, be able to:

• analyse, synthesise, evaluate and apply knowledge
• perform a range of technical and clinical skills and procedures
• demonstrate the attitudes and behaviours necessary for professional practice as a consultant clinical scientist dealing with the complexities, uncertainties and tensions of professional practice at this level.

Knowledge and understanding

By the end of the training period the trainee will be able to demonstrate the ability to analyse, evaluate and synthesise relevant knowledge and its application to their professional practice in relation to:

• the methods of standardisation and calibration
• common method interferences
• the use of pipettes
• preparation and storage of reagents
• use of centrifuges
• maintenance of centrifuges
• mechanisms of common interferences in laboratory assays
• heterophilic antibodies, how they interfere in assays, and how the interference can be detected and eliminated
• automated instruments including their layout, robotics and modules
• the principles of spectrophometric methods
• the applications of spectrophotometry and turbidimetry
• the principle of osmometry
• the principle of electrometric methods
• how ion selective electrodes work and how they are used in clinical applications
• the principles of enzymology
• the advantages and disadvantages of different measurement methods involving enzymes
• the use of enzymes as reagents
• the principles of immunochemical techniques
• the advantages and disadvantages of competitive binding and immunometric assays
• the labels available in immunoassays and the instrumentation applicable to each
• the principles of electrophoresis
• the principles of chromatography
• the principles, advantages and disadvantages of point-of-care testing
• the types of point-of-care devices available
• the principles of solid/dry phase chemistry
• the advantages and disadvantages of these methods
• clinical applications of these methods.

Technical and clinical skills

By the end of the training period the trainee will be able to demonstrate a critical understanding of current relevant research, theory and knowledge and its application to the performance of the following technical procedures and laboratory skills:

• the performance of methods used in clinical biochemistry
• results of investigations into sources of error
• spectrophotometric method
• osmometry assay
• electrometric method
• enzymology method
• immunochemical assay
• serum electrophoresis
• chromatographic technique
• point-of-care assay
• the limitations of widely used methods in clinical biochemistry
• sources of error
• setting up and running of an assay
• possible assay interference.

By the end of the training period trainees will, in respect of the clinical biochemistry laboratory and its clinical interface, be able to perform the clinical skills necessary to manage under supervision:

• methods for the measurement of analytes.