Specimen Requirements
Title
Zinc, Serum or Plasma
Specimen Requirement
Collect royal blue EDTA or royal blue no additive, centrifuge within 45 minutes, pipette 2 mL serum/plasma into a screw top transport tube, indicate sample type on tube and send.
Methodology
Inductively coupled plasma/mass spectrometry (ICP/MS)
Stability
Room temp: 14 days, Refrigerated: 14 days, Frozen: 14 days
Reference Range
By report*
Turnaround
2-4 days
Clinical Use
Monitor exposure to zinc; evaluate suspected nutritional inadequacy, especially in enteral or parental nutrition, critically ill or burn patients; cases of diabetes or delayed wound healing; growth retardation; follow therapy, for example when higher intravenous zinc doses are used to balance excessive ongoing GI losses in long-term total parenteral nutrition; follow oral zinc therapy in Wilson disease; confirm acrodermatitis enteropathica and follow therapy
Test Code
ZINC