News
Do you have an allergy?
Wednesday 5th August 2020
Dr John Rees
The UK has one of the highest rates of allergies in the entire world. Allergies can range in severity from mild hay fever symptoms for a few days during the summer to life threatening allergic reactions. There have been many reasons proposed for why we have such a high rate of allergies in the UK with around 40% reporting allergy related symptoms. Allergies are often the triggers for asthma, eczema and symptoms of hay fever as well as life threatening anaphylactic reactions to foods and drugs. Whether we get allergies depends mostly on our genes. If both your parents have an allergy then the risk of you having allergies too can be as high as 80%. These genetic risks together with…
Using a SELFCheck Blood Test is Easy
Thursday 2nd July 2020
JR Biomedical Ltd
All SELFCheck self test kits are manufactured and assembled according to a stringent medical quality system (ISO13485) and have been independently evaluated by scientific and clinical experts to check that the tests are easy to use and give reliable results by anyone at home. Even if you are a healthcare professional, and are familiar with using point of care blood tests, it is essential that you read the instructions provided with the test as medical tests from one manufacturer to another often vary in the way they are to be used. Providing you follow the instructions as written you should find that the test is easy to use and gives you a result in minutes. The video below shows one of our colleagues…
Reasons for 'invalid' self test results
Wednesday 24th June 2020
SELFCheck
Invalid test results are extremely rare and almost always due to the instructions not being followed as written. The photo here shows a test cassette where not enough blood has been added and an invalid result. It is a legal requirement in the UK and EU that all self test kits undergo user trials with lay persons as part of the independent scientific and clinical checks to show that most people find the instructions easy to follow and can interpret the results correctly. Only if the results of these trials are positive is a self test kit allowed to be sold to the general public (IVD Directive 98/79EC). All batches of SELFCheck self test kits are manufactured and assembled in ISO13485 certified…
COVID-19 (SARS-CoV-2) Nucleocapsid (N) protein significance in serology diagnosis used in COVID-19 (SARS-CoV-2) ELISA
Thursday 11th June 2020
Demeditec GmbH
The COVID-19 (SARS-CoV-2) ELISA uses the SARS-CoV-2 nucleocapsid protein (N protein) as antigen for the detection of antibodies to SARS-CoV-2. The N protein is a structural component of the helical nucleocapsid and plays an important role in viral pathogenesis, replication and RNA packaging. Furthermore, this protein is more conserved than other proteins of the virus, such as spike and membrane glycoproteins [1-3]. It is well known that S1 (part of the spike protein) and N proteins are the dominant antigens of SARS-CoV and SARS-CoV-2 that elicit IgG, IgM and IgA antibodies, and antibody response against N protein is usually stronger [4]. Studies have demonstrated for SARS-CoV that among all coronavirus proteins, the N protein is the most abundant throughout infection…
A new type of pregnancy test
Tuesday 21st April 2020
SELFCheck
You think you're pregnant. You rush out to the supermarket, hand over ten quid for a well known branded pregnancy test, get home, read the instructions and realise that to get a reliable result you have to wait until tomorrow morning as the test requires an early morning urine sample. Some good news. Leading consumer self test brand SELFCheck have now launched a 5 minute, finger-prick blood spot pregnancy test that you can use as soon as you get home. Blood tests can be more reliable than urine tests for showing that you are pregnant and, for this reason, are sometimes used in hospital labs to confirm a urine pregnancy test. Unlike urine pregnancy tests, you can use a blood test at any…
Coronavirus rapid tests - a warning
Thursday 19th March 2020
Some manufacturers are selling products for the diagnosis of COVID-19 infection in community settings, such as pharmacies and online. The current view by Public Health England (PHE) is that use of these products is NOT advised: some of these products look for virus while others look for the body's immune response to the virus. Such tests are very rapid and can work on a range of specimens including serum, plasma or finger-prick whole bloodthere is little information on the accuracy of the tests, or on how a patient's antibody response develops or changes during the course of a COVID-19 infection. It is not known whether either a positive or negative result is reliableat the very early stages of infection there is a…
New Thyroid Health Test
Thursday 21st November 2019
Symptoms of an under active thyroid gland are quite general and can easily be dismissed. According to the NHS, symptoms of an underactive thyroid are often similar to those of other conditions, and they usually develop slowly, that they may not be noticed for years. The only accurate way of finding out whether you have a thyroid problem is to have a thyroid function test, where a sample of blood is tested to measure your hormone levels. Thyroid disorders are one of the most common disorders in the world, and are more common in women. The patient support group Thyroid UK, state that hypothyroidism is mostly seen in women between the ages of 40 - 50 and is ten times more…
Self test kits and early diagnosis
Monday 7th October 2019
JR Biomedical Ltd
SELFCheck is a range of easy to use medical health screening self test kits that you can buy from your pharmacy and use in private at home. SELFCheck tests give you a result within minutes without the need to send your sample in the post and waiting days for results. As you do the test yourself you also avoid paying expensive laboratory fees. SELFCheck test kits are available to check for different medical conditions, some require a finger prick blood drop such as the gluten sensitivity test for coeliac disease or stomach ulcer test whilst other tests require a swab, urine or stool sample. Step-by-step, easy to follow instructions are provided together with information on what your test result means so…
How to use SELFCheck finger pricker lancets
Monday 23rd September 2019
JR Biomedical Ltd
One of the main issues surrounding self test kits has always been the need for a small blood sample. This is usually taken from the finger tip and in most cases only a drop or two of blood is required. The procedure is quite simple using 'automatic' lancets (finger prickers) that are routinely used in hospitals and clinics. The lancets provided with SELFCheck kits have been specifically chosen to be easy to use and provide sufficient blood for the tests. Although the lancets are not difficult to use, it is important to read and understand the instructions before touching the lancet to avoid inadvertently triggering the device. Once the lancet is triggered, a needle is fired, punctures the finger tip and…
Superdrug launches SELFCheck self test kits online
Wednesday 18th September 2019
We are pleased to welcome Superdrug as one of our latest retailers supplying SELFCheck self test kits online in the UK. SELFCheck self test kits allow anybody to check whether they have markers in their blood or urine for common health conditions such as gluten sensitivity (coeliac disease), colon polyps and stomach ulcers. The SELFCheck tests take around 5 to 10 minutes to complete and you get a result there and then in the privacy of your own home - avoiding the need to send your blood sample away, waiting days or weeks for results and sometimes expensive lab fees. But perhaps one of the key benefits of the SELFCheck brand is that consumers can be confident that the tests give results…