Lipemic or icteric samples can interfere with spectrophotometric assays; what should you do?

Prepare for the CAMLPR Specimen Collection Competency Test. Practice with diverse question sets including multiple-choice and flashcards. Each question includes hints and explanations to help you become proficient before the exam.

Interference from lipemia or icterus occurs because turbidity and pigment change how light passes through the sample, skewing spectrophotometric readings and leading to inaccurate results. The best action is to document the occurrence and request a redraw. This response preserves result integrity and patient safety by ensuring a clean specimen is used for measurement. Ignoring the interference would yield unreliable data, diluting with water can distort analyte concentrations and doesn’t remove the interfering substances, and storing at room temperature won’t resolve the interference.