The Creation and Management of Innovations in Healthcare and ICT: The European and African Experience.

The purpose of the study was to gain new insights into innovation systems by comparing state-of-the-art of existing approaches of innovation creation and innovation management in healthcare and ICT. It is unique, in that it compares countries in Africa with countries in Europe in order to identify similarities and differences regarding the creation and management of innovations. The main similarity is that early dialogue between different stakeholders was underrepresented during the whole innovation process in all countries.

Impact of pH on Urine Chemistry Assayed on Roche Analyzers.

Background: The pH may impact the concentration of certain urinary parameters, making urine pre-treatment questionable.

Methods: 1) Determining the impact of pH in vitro on the urinary concentration of chemistry parameters assayed on Roche Modular analyzers. 2) Evaluating whether concentrations depended on pH in non-pretreated urines from patients.

Agreement between arterial and venous lactate in emergency department patients: a prospective study of 157 consecutive patients.

Introduction: In the emergency department (ED), lactate is routinely used for risk stratification. Whether venous or arterial lactate measured on blood gas is interchangeable is not known. We hypothesized that venous lactate can be used instead of arterial lactate for the evaluation of acute patients in the ED.

High-Sensitivity Cardiac Troponin T: a Preanalytical Evaluation.

Background: Little is known about the effects of preanalytical conditions on high-sensitivity cardiac troponin T (hs-cTnT) concentrations.

Methods: Variations of hs-cTnT concentrations were evaluated under the following preanalytical conditions: 1) serum vs. lithium-heparin (Li-Hep) plasma, with or without separator gel; 2) centrifugation time (15-minutes vs.