Blood lactate concentration has been identified as a prognostic indicator in chelonians and has been reported to decrease in snakes with induced acute tubular necrosis. However, comparison among various studies about lactatemia is hindered by the fact that various point-of-care analyzers are used. We thought to evaluate agreement, correlation and proportion bias between three commonly used handheld analyzers, the Lactate Plus (Nova), iStat (Abbott) et EPOC (Heska), using chelonians presented with a wide range of lactatemia. Turtles included in the study had various health status and included Eastern painted turtles (Chrysemis picta picta), snapping turtles (Chelydra serpentina), musk turtles (Sternotherus odoratus), and wood turtles (Glyptemys insculpta) among others. A single blood sample obtained from each individual was analyzed concomitantly by two analyzers per sample. Data distribution was evaluated using a Shapiro-Wilk test. Agreement between the analyzers was evaluated via a Bland-Altman plot and correlation via a Spearman correlation test. Bias was determined using a Passing-Bablok regression analysis. There was a fair agreement between Lactate Plus results and the iStat and EPOC results respectively. Agreement was suboptimal at higher concentrations and the iStat analyzer overestimated high blood lactate values compared to values obtained with the Lactate Plus. Correlation between the analyzers was fair. In comparison with loggerhead sea turtles, lower agreement and correlation were noted between the iStat and the Lactate Plus. This highlights the need to conduct studies in various reptile species to evaluate the performance of point-of-care analyzers. This project was funded by the NSERC of Canada.
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