The sex of an individual is typically assigned at birth based on the appearance of the external genitalia. Chromosomal testing can determine whether a person is biologically male (1 X chromosome and 1 ...

Laboratory testing supports most clinical decision-making; however, the concept of a fixed “normal” value is theoretical. Studies have suggested that approximately 7 out of 10 clinical decisions rely ...

Your doctor says everything looks fine, but you still feel terrible. The problem might not be your health but how labs define “normal.” Understanding the difference between normal and optimal could ...

In medicine, a person’s blood-test results are compared with the average range in a population. But results are highly individual and tightly regulated around a person’s own stable values. Changes to ...

Although clinicians understand the importance of reference ranges for the interpretation of laboratory results, they may not consider that a borderline result outside the analytically valid reference ...