Hope for the clinical laboratory: from the viewpoint of the thyroidologist

We have tried to screen for hyperthyroidism by neural networks using routine test data (without hormonal data), and found that screening with a set of three parameters (alkaline phosphatase, creatinine, and total cholesterol) allowed for quite accurate screening. The trouble in this study was that the methods of measurement for blood chemistry have sometimes changed in our hospital and the reference ranges have changed accordingly. Therefore, the data obtained several years ago could not be used. There were also remarkable inter-laboratory differences in free thyroxine measurement. We hope that the standardization of clinical laboratory measurement will be achieved in nationwide in the near future.