Changing face of clinical chemistry laboratory under the influence of industry and technology

Abstract

Early clinical laboratories date back to the period between 1790 to 1840, when the French physician and chemist Antoine Francois Fourcroy (1755-1809)1 proposed setting up of a chemical laboratory near the ward in hospitals, so that, “excretions, urine and various discharges of the sick” could be subjected to chemical analysis so as to investigate the nature of disease. Alexander Marcet (17701822)2 developed chemical tests for examination of calculi while William Prout (1785-1850)3 developed a simple test for diagnosing diabetes and diseases of the urinary tracts. During this phase, chemical tests for diagnosing disease were performed occasionally on the bedside of the patients using few reagents and glassware without a separate laboratory room.4