Effect of different methods for outlier detection and rejection when calculating cut off values for diagnosis of lupus anticoagulants

摘要

Background: Lupus anticoagulant (LA)-detection is performed by testing plasma with activated partial thromboplastin time (APTT)-derived and dilute-Russell-viper-venom (dRVV)-derived tests. Results are interpreted by comparison to cut-off values determined by testing plasma from healthy-subjects. Several issues are concerned with the determination of LA cut-offs. Among them, the identification/rejection of outliers (i.e., aberrant values) prior statistical analysis is one of the most important and poorly defined.