Urine test strips

Urine test strips

A urine test strip is a semi-quantitative rapid test for urine examination . It can be used to detect various constituents in the urine and thus draw conclusions about various diseases. Urine test strips are available in various designs with one to eleven examination parameters. Common parameters are blood / erythrocytes / hemoglobin , glucose , ketone bodies , ascorbic acid , protein , leukocytes , nitrite , specific gravity , pH value , bilirubin (→ bilirubinuria ) and urobilinogen . The corresponding ingredients can also be assessed in terms of their concentration using a color comparison scale. Urine test strips only require a small amount of urine and are a quick and inexpensive test method, but only serve as a rough guide.

The presence of erythrocytes, hemoglobin, or blood indicates hematuria , the detection limit is 1.5 mg / l. The lower detection limit for glucose is 100 mg / dl; an increase is an indication of diabetes mellitus or De Toni Fanconi syndrome . Keto bodies are an indication of ketoacidosis ; the lower detection limit is 50 mg / l. The protein detection only shows albumin and this only at an amount above 300 mg / l, which is why microalbuminuria is not detected with the standard test strips. High levels of albumin are a sign of kidney corpuscle damage . Nitrite is detected from an amount of 0.6 mg / l and is an indication of an infection of the urinary tract with gram-negative bacteria. An increased bilirubin level is an indication of jaundice .

Urine test strips are designed for testing human urine. They are only suitable to a limited extent for examining animal urine samples; they only provide reliable results for pH value, glucose, ketone, protein, bilirubin and erythrocytes / hemoglobin. However, only negative evidence is meaningful for protein, while the various positive levels of evidence hardly correlate with the actual protein content in the urine of dogs.

The French chemist Jules Maumené (1818–1898) developed the first urine test strip in 1850 for the detection of glucose. It was not until the 1950s that multi-parameter urine test strips became commercially available. In 1964 Boehringer Mannheim (since 1998 Roche Diagnostics ) introduced the Combur test , which is still widely used today .

Individual evidence

1. ^ Christine Schottdorf-Timm, Volker Maier: Laboratory values . GU Kompass, Verlag Gräfe und Unzer 2008, ISBN 9783833811425 , p. 90.
2. ↑ Harald Renz: Practical Laboratory Diagnostics: A textbook on laboratory medicine, clinical chemistry and hematology . Walter de Gruyter 2010, ISBN 9783110195767 , p. 254 ff.
3. ^ Reto Neiger: Differential Diagnoses of Internal Medicine in Dogs and Cats. Enke-Verlag 2009, ISBN 978-3-8304-1064-5 , p. 10.
4. ↑ Grauer GF .: Proteinuria: measurement and interpretation of proteinuria and albuminuria. International Renal Interest Society website. http://www.iris-kidney.com/education/proteinuria.html . Updated 2016. Accessed August 26, 2019.

This article is about a health issue. It is not used for self-diagnosis and does not replace a diagnosis by a doctor. Please note the information on health issues !