ASMS 2023: A Look at the Tuesday Afternoon Oral Session on Clinical Analysis: Applications

From 2:30–4:30 p.m., there was an oral session titled “Clinical Analysis: Applications” which took place in General Assembly C. The session, chaired and presided over by Russell Grant of LabCorp, included six talks on applying mass spectrometry techniques to clinical studies and diagnostics.

At 2:30 p.m., Abraham Badu-Tawiah of The Ohio State University in Columbus, Ohio, USA discussed a field study in Ghana, West Africa where 500 volunteers were screened for asymptomatic malaria using a novel and sensitive chemical signal amplification strategy achieved with portable mass spectrometers.

Next, at 2:50 p.m., Donald Chace of Capitainer AB in Solna, Stockholm, Sweden reported on a new quantitative dried blood spot collection device for the detection of lead in blood by flow-injection inductively coupled plasma-mass spectrometry (ICP-MS).

Third in the session, at 3:10 p.m., Jana Zecha of AstraZeneca in Gaithersburg, Maryland, USA continued on the topic of blood by discussing the challenges in clinical plasma proteomics studies, specifically with regard to comorbidity- and survival-associated COVID-19 plasma protein signatures.

Fourth, at 3:30 p.m., Jeff Whiteaker of the Fred Hutchinson Cancer Center in Seattle, Washington, USA took a look at how targeted proteomics can enable multiplex quantification of immunomodulatory and DNA mismatch repair proteins in formalin-fixed, paraffin-embedded (FFPE) tissue specimens.

After that, at 3:50 p.m., Stephen Merrigan of ARUP Laboratories in Salt Lake City, Utah, USA talked about the use of in-well ion pairing for reverse phase retention and interference separation of plasma catecholamines by liquid chromatography coupled to tandem mass spectrometry (LC–MS/MS).

Rounding out the session at 4:10 p.m. was Tabatha Hambidge of LGC in Teddington, London, UK, who discussed the use of robotic automation to advance standardization and traceability in clinical diagnostics.