Vacutainer tubes and their uses

1. What are vacutainer tubes?
These are the color coded plastic tubes with rubber stopper.
They are used to collect blood for various investigation

2. Mention the different vacutainer tubes and their uses
Red: No anticoagulant, used for serological examination in biochemistry
Grey: Contains Sodium Fluoride, Used for glucose estimation
Lavender/ purple: contains EDTA, used in hematological examination like complete
hemogram, ESR,
Light Blue: contains 3.2% sodium citrate, used for coagulation studies like PT, APTT
Green: contains heparin, used for bone marrow studies
Yellow: Contains citrate, used for blood culture

3. What is the ratio of sodium citrate used in coagulation studies?
1:9 ratio

4. What is the difference between plasma and serum?
PLASMA: obtained by centrifugation of anticoagulant added blood and it contain all coagulation factors except calcium ions
SERUM: obtained when blood undergoes clotting and it does not contain clotting factors

5. What are the uses of plasma?
Used in coagulation studies like PT, APTT and TT

6. What are the uses of serum?
Used in various biochemical studies like enzyme level estimation , serum uric acid , serum electrolytes estimation etc.