Westgard rules, explained simply
What the Westgard multirules actually mean, why 1-2s is a warning and not a stop sign, how each rule points to random or systematic error, and where Sigma metrics fit in.
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Lab science, decoded.
Bite-size clinical chemistry videos for uni students, new grads and curious lab people. Find me on YouTube @orvillemalijan →
📈 Quality Control
Westgard rules, Levey-Jennings charts and keeping results trustworthy.
Reading a Levey-Jennings chart
A practical guide to the Levey-Jennings chart: where the mean and SD lines come from, how to tell a shift from a trend, why lot changes matter, and what to do when a QC rule fails.
Read the article →🧪 Analysers
How the big chemistry analysers actually work, from photometry to ISEs.
Inside a clinical chemistry analyser
Follow a blood sample through a chemistry analyser: the sample path, sample and reagent pipetting, carryover, incubation, and how photometry and the Beer-Lambert law turn colour into a number, including where that breaks down.
Read the article →Ion-selective electrodes 101
How labs measure sodium, potassium and chloride with ion-selective electrodes, the difference between direct and indirect ISE, and the error sources every scientist should know, from the electrolyte exclusion effect to tired electrodes.
Read the article →🔬 Interpreting Results
What the numbers mean, and when they might be lying to you.
Haemolysis and why it matters
What haemolysis is, how in vitro and in vivo haemolysis differ, why it pushes potassium and other analytes up, how labs use HIL indices to flag or suppress results, and the most common causes.
Read the article →Reference intervals vs decision limits
Why the numbers next to your result aren't all the same kind of number. Reference intervals describe healthy people, decision limits drive clinical action, as HbA1c, lipids and troponin show.
Read the article →🎓 Lab Careers
Getting into the lab, growing in it, and branching out from it.
So you want to be a Medical Laboratory Scientist
The Australian pathway into medical laboratory science: AIMS-accredited degrees, AIMS membership, scientist and technician roles, the disciplines you can specialise in, the truth about registration, and postgraduate options including FAIMS.
From the bench to building software
PLACEHOLDER write-up: lessons from moving between laboratory work and tech, and the skills that transfer.