Received on November 3, 2003
Accepted on January 29, 2004

General Clinical Chemistry

Model for Predicting the Impact of Gadolinium on Plasma Calcium Measured by the o-Cresolphthalein Method

¹ Division of Laboratory Medicine, Department of Pathology and Immunology, Washington University School of Medicine, 660 S. Euclid Ave., St. Louis, MO 63110
² Department of Radiology, Washington University School of Medicine, Mallinckrodt Institute of Radiology, St. Louis, MO

^* To whom correspondence should be addressed. E-mail: parvin{at}wustl.edu.

Background: Gadolinium formulations, which are administered as contrast agents in magnetic resonance imaging examinations, interfere with colorimetric serum calcium determinations.

Methods: We performed an in vitro study to determine the extent to which three gadolinium formulations--gadodiamide (Omniscan), gadopentetate dimeglumine (Magnevist), and gadoversetamide (OptiMARK)--affect measurements by two methods that use o-cresolphthalein (Dade Behring, Inc. and Roche Diagnostics) and one that uses arsenazo dye (Equal Diagnostics). We also compared values from the o-cresolphthalein methods for 116 samples from patients administered gadodiamide.

Results: Magnevist did not affect any of the methods evaluated, whereas Omniscan and OptiMARK were identical in their effects. For the Dade method, the differences from the control sample were 4.0 and 7.0 mg/L at 0.25 and 0.5mmol/L gadolinium, respectively. For the Roche method, the differences were 19, 9.0, and 5.0 mg/L at 0.5, 0.25, and 0.125 mmol/L gadolinium, respectively. Falsely increased calcium values were seen when samples were measured by the arsenazo-based method: differences were 6.0 and 3.0 mg/L at 1.0 and 0.5 mmol/L gadolinium. Using patient data collected at our institution, we were able to generate a model for predicting, from a patient’s glomerular filtration rate and the time elapsed since administration, the impact of Omniscan on calcium measurements by the o-cresolphthalein method from Roche Diagnostics.

Conclusions: The predictive model can be used to calculate, in patients who have received gadodiamide, the minimum length of time to wait before blood collection to avoid pseudohypocalcemia when the Roche o-cresolphthalein method is used.