Additional Specimen Collection Information

Invert the sodium citrate tube end to end 4 times to
thoroughly mix blood and anticoagulant. The tube should be left
stoppered until time of testing. Specimens stored at room
temperature should be centrifuged and tested within four hours of
specimen collection.

Precautions:

• It is not recommended to use a winged blood
  collection set (Butterfly).
• If a vacuum tube butterfly must be used, the first tube in the
  series will be under-filled. Collect a “discard citrate
  tube”, and then collect the citrate tube used for testing.
  This will ensure the proper blood to anticoagulant ratio.
• If using a syringe, use a BD Blood Transfer Device to transfer
  blood from the syringe to the citrate tube within one minute of
  collection. Hold the syringe with the plunger in the up-right
  position and allow the vacuum present to fill the tube. Before
  collection, be sure the syringe plunger is pushed to the top of the
  syringe. The transfer device may pop up and needs to be
  held down to completely fill tube to between fill
  lines.
• Do not “force fill” blood into a vacuum tube. This
  may result in activation of the platelets possibly leading to
  erroneous results. Allow the vacuum present to fill the tube.
• Do not remove vacuum tube cap to add blood.
• Specimens should be obtained from a single venipuncture with
  minimal tissue trauma. Never combine multiple blood collections
  into a single vacuum tube.
• Never re-use a syringe that was used for a pic line saline
  flush.

Refer to the “Citrated Plasma for Coagulation Studies” protocol
in the Quality Assurance Manual.