JPH07270428A - Automatic chemical analyzer - Google Patents

Abstract

PURPOSE:To avoid a situation in which data number is limited in a memory apparatus, and prevent the measurement with the same combination by lessening the number of data number obtained by the measurement to check cross- contamination in a reagent injection system. CONSTITUTION:To search the combination of items with which a reagent injecting system is cross-contaminated, an automatic chemical analyzer is provided with a processing part 32 which starts measurement from an item in a first turn to the last including all the P types of assigned items for all of the (P-1) pieces of continuously numbered samples, assigns the measurement order of the items in order not to form the same measurement combination among the (P-1) pieces of the samples, and issues a work sheet automatically to instruct that only the first item should be measured for a next sample following those samples, a data computing part 34 which takes in the measurement results for every item from an analyzing part 30 which carriers out analysis according to the work sheet issued from the processing part 32, compares the results with a standard value, and judges whether cross-contamination occors or not, and a holding file part 36 to hold the results as cross-contamination data at the time of normal measurement.

Description

Detailed Description of the Invention

[0001]

BACKGROUND OF THE INVENTION 1. Field of the Invention The present invention relates to an automatic chemical analyzer for measuring the concentration or activity value of a target component in a sample containing multiple components such as blood and urine.

[0002]

2. Description of the Related Art The analysis unit of such an automatic chemical analyzer is equipped with a sample injection mechanism for dispensing a sample into a reaction container along with an annular reaction line in which the reaction containers are arranged in a line and conveyed. At least a reagent injection mechanism for dispensing a reagent into the injected reaction container, an absorptiometer for measuring the absorbance of the reaction solution in the reaction container, and a cleaning mechanism for cleaning the reaction container are provided. In such a so-called single-multi type automatic analyzer, the reagent dispenser of the reagent injection mechanism is washed and repeatedly used, but the reagent adhering to the reagent dispenser can be completely removed by washing. Instead, it may cause cross contamination. Cross-contamination may or may not occur depending on the type of item or reagent, so at each facility, the reagents actually used are set in an automatic chemical analyzer to check for cross-contamination.

Since the automatic chemical analysis device is a random selection, it is necessary to check the combination of all items. In order to measure many items in the reagent injection mechanism,
Each reagent is sequentially dispensed using a common reagent dispenser. Therefore, it is necessary to check the combination of items that cause cross contamination in the reagent injection mechanism. If there are multiple measurement requests for a sample,
Cross-contamination is checked by measuring these items in a fixed order, for example, in the order of measurement items. A worksheet is issued to determine the item measurement order for checking cross contamination, and the automatic analyzer measures according to the worksheet.

An example of the worksheet is shown in FIG. 2 when a request for measurement of 5 items is given to a sample.
The one shown in (A) is considered. The vertical number indicates the sample number (S-No.), And the horizontal number indicates the item (C-No.).
H), and the * mark indicates that the reagent of the item is dispensed and the measurement is performed. In the example of this table, item 1 is measured for the first sample, items 1 and 2 are measured for the subsequent second sample, and item 1 is measured for the next third sample. And 3 and so on. Each measurement is performed by injecting the sample and the reagent corresponding to the item into the reaction container. Distinguishing different sample numbers does not mean that different sample types are used; the same sample is dispensed.

In FIG. 2A, the measurement order of items is 1 → 2 →
1 → 3 → 1 → 4 → ... After these measurements are completed, each measurement result is filled in the table as shown in FIG. 2C and compared in the vertical direction. Is there cross contamination? You can judge whether. The diagonal line shown by the broken line in this table is the measured value when the same item continues. Since there is no cross-contamination between the same items, this can be used as a reference value when determining the presence or absence of cross-contamination in other data. When deciding whether there is cross-contamination in the reagent injection mechanism, it is assumed that cross-contamination only affects the next item and does not affect subsequent items. It is also premised that there is no cross-contamination between cells due to repeated use of reaction cells. If it is not necessary to use the measurement value when the same item continues as the reference value for determining the presence or absence of cross contamination, the measurement in which the same item is continued can be excluded from the worksheet of FIG. 2A. The sheet can be a little simplified as shown in FIG.

[0006]

In the worksheets of FIGS. 2 (A) and 2 (B), combinations of consecutive item numbers such as 1 → 2, 2 → 3 appear twice, so that unnecessary measurement is performed. Will be included. In addition, when the measurement data is written in the file of the storage device, when the worksheet of FIG. 2 (A) or (B) is executed, the sample number of those worksheets is changed to the data number. And the data numbers have a one-to-one correspondence. The data length of each data number is fixed, and generally has a length to write multiple data, but the data storage format is the same as the storage format during normal analysis, and there is no limit to the data numbers that can be used at one time. is there. Therefore, when it is desired to perform a measurement for checking cross-contamination of multiple items repeated a plurality of times at a time, the number of data becomes large and there is a possibility that the limitation of the data number will be caught.

Therefore, according to the present invention, the number of data numbers obtained by the measurement for checking the cross contamination of the reagent injection mechanism is reduced to avoid the limitation of the data numbers, and the measurement of the same combination is eliminated. The purpose is to reduce the time.

[0008]

According to the present invention, a worksheet is automatically issued when the number of items is specified, cross contamination is automatically checked according to the worksheet, and the result is measured at the time of normal measurement. It is retained as the cross contamination data of.

Therefore, the present invention is constructed as shown in FIG. 30 is the analysis unit of the automatic analyzer,
It is equipped with a reaction line, a sample injection mechanism, a reagent injection mechanism, an absorptiometer, and a cleaning mechanism. The control unit 31 controls the operation of each unit of the analysis unit 30 according to the worksheet, calculates the concentration or activity value of the sample from the absorbance from the spectrophotometer, and also combines the items that cause cross contamination of the reagent injection mechanism. In order to search for the specified number P of items, for all (P-1) samples with consecutive sample numbers, all the items of P types are included, and the measurement is started from the first item, The measurement order of items is specified so that the same combination of measurement orders does not appear among (P-1) samples,
According to the processing unit 32 that automatically issues a worksheet designated to measure only the first item in the next sample following those (P-1) samples, and the worksheet issued by the processing unit 32. A data calculation unit 34 that takes in measurement results for each item from the analysis unit 30 that has performed the analysis operation and compares the measurement results with a reference value to determine the presence or absence of cross contamination.
And a file unit 36 that holds the determination result as cross contamination data during normal measurement.

[0010]

When the operation mode for checking the cross contamination is designated, the processing unit 32 automatically creates a check worksheet according to the designated number of items. The analysis unit 30 is controlled by the control unit 31 so as to perform analysis according to the worksheet. In the data calculation unit 34, the measured data is processed item by item, compared with a reference value, and if it is out of the reference value, it is determined that the combination has cross contamination, and the file unit 36
Memorized in. The data stored in the file unit 36 is used to prevent cross contamination during normal analysis.

[0011]

EXAMPLES An example will be described in which a sample is checked for cross contamination of five items. Consider a pentagon as shown in FIG. 3, and assign item numbers 1 to 5 to each vertex. (A) to (D) correspond to the measurement of each sample having a continuous sample number, and since the number of items P is 5, it is 4
The measurement order for (= 5-1) sample numbers is shown.

For the first sample, as shown in (A), the measurement was carried out starting from item 1 so that the peaks proceed in numerical order, resulting in items 1 → 2 → 3 → 4 → 5 → 1 and returning to item 1. Come on. In the next sample, as shown in (B),
If you proceed from item 1 to every other item for the first time, item 1 → 3 → 5 →
It becomes 2 → 4 → 1 and returns to item 1. Similarly, in the next sample, every two pieces are advanced as in (C), and in the next sample, every three pieces are advanced as in (D).
This is summarized in FIG. 4 (A). Sample number 1
3 to 4 correspond to FIGS. 3A to 3D. Only the item 1 is measured in the 5th sample. That is, sample numbers 1 to 4
For, the items 1 to 5 were all measured, but the order of measurement was changed for each sample number. This measures the combination between all items. With the worksheet in FIG. 4A, the same combination will not be repeated twice.

When it is desired to repeat the measurement twice in order to improve the reliability of the measurement data, the same measurement as the sample numbers 1 to 4 in FIG. 1 should be measured. In this case, the combination of each measurement item is measured twice.

As the number of items to be checked increases,
For example, the number of sample numbers required for checking 30 items of cross contamination is 436 in the case of the worksheet of FIG. 2B, whereas it is 436 in the case of the worksheet of the present invention of FIG. 4A. Then, it becomes 30, and it can be seen that the number of data required for writing the measurement data is significantly reduced.

In the description of FIGS. 3 and 4A, the number P of items to be checked is 5 which is a prime number, but when the number P of items is a composite number, when the method as shown in FIG. 3 is adopted. , A loop is formed when connecting the vertices, and the measurement order cannot be determined by the same method. An example of that case is shown in FIG.
Shown in. FIG. 4C shows a case where the number of items P to be checked is four. At this time, it is larger than the number of items P (= 4) and is 1
Dummy items are automatically created by the difference from the nearest prime number (5 in this case). In the dummy item, the analysis unit does not perform sample dispensing, reagent dispensing, or washing, and the cell is sent in an empty state. FIG. 4C shows the case of four items. D indicates a dummy item.

Further, for example, the number of items to be checked is 24
If it is, the following 25 to 28 are composite numbers and the next prime number is 29, which requires 5 channels as dummy items, resulting in a lot of waste. If there is no prime number immediately after this, divide it into the prime number immediately before and the remaining number, check the number of items of the prime number, and then cross between the remaining item and the item checked first. It is better to create a worksheet that checks for contamination.
Therefore, when the number of items to be checked is 24, the check may be performed between 23 items and then the remaining 1 item and the previous 23 items may be checked.

In an automatic chemical analyzer that repeatedly uses reaction vessels, cross contamination may occur between the reaction vessels. If cross-contamination in the reaction vessel is known, and when the combination occurs in the analysis after the second round, do not dispense the sample and the reagent into the reaction vessel and skip the reaction vessel. Good.

FIG. 5 shows an example of the analysis section of the automatic chemical analyzer to which the present invention is applied. Reference numeral 2 is a reaction disk, and along the cuvette roller 3, reaction vessels 4 also serving as cuvettes are arranged in a line to form an annular reaction line 5. A sample injection mechanism 6 is arranged along the reaction line 5 for injecting a sample specimen into the reaction container. In the sample injection mechanism 6, the sample cups 7 are arranged along the circumference of the sampling table 8, and the sample dispenser 9 is arranged to dispense the sample from the sample cup 7 at the sample suction and collection position 13. . A dispensing nozzle 10 is provided at the tip of the sample dispenser 9, and the dispensing nozzle 10 moves along a moving path 11 between a reaction container at a sample dispensing position 14 and a sample cup at a sample aspirating and sampling position 13. Moving. A cleaning pot 12 is provided on the moving path 11 so that the nozzle 10 can be cleaned. In the cross contamination checking mode, the movement of the sample transfer mechanism in the reaction disk 2 is changed so that the same sample can be sucked many times so that a large number of check samples need not be prepared.

A reagent injection mechanism 16 is arranged along the reaction line 5 in order to inject the reagent into the reaction container into which the sample has been dispensed. In the reagent injection mechanism 16, the reagent container 17 is arranged along the circumference of the reagent tray 18, and the reagent dispenser 19 is arranged to dispense the reagent from the reagent container 17 at the reagent suction and collection position 23. .
A dispensing nozzle 20 is provided at the tip of the reagent dispenser 19, and the dispensing nozzle 20 runs between the reaction container at the reagent dispensing position 24 and the reagent container at the reagent aspirating and sampling position 23 along the movement path 21. Moving. A cleaning pot 22 is arranged on the moving path 21 so that the nozzle 20 can be cleaned. A washing and dehydrator 26 is further arranged on the reaction line 5,
An absorptiometer 27 corresponding to the measurement unit along the reaction line 5
Is also arranged. The reaction line 5 rotates intermittently in the direction of arrow 15.

[0020]

When the measurement for checking the presence or absence of cross contamination is carried out according to the worksheet issued by the present invention, the data number for storing the measurement data is reduced, and the processing section is arranged along the data storage section which the processing section has in advance. Data can be stored. Further, since the combination of the same measurement order does not appear, the measurement is not wasted.

[Brief description of drawings]

FIG. 1 is a block diagram showing the present invention.

FIG. 2 is an example of a generally considered worksheet (A),
(B) and Table (C) at the time of checking cross contamination.

FIG. 3 is a diagram showing an item measurement order in one embodiment.

FIG. 4 is a diagram illustrating an example of a worksheet according to an embodiment.

FIG. 5 is a schematic plan view showing an analysis unit of an automatic chemical analysis device to which the present invention is applied.

[Explanation of symbols]

 30 analysis unit 32 processing unit 34 data calculation unit 36 file unit

Claims (1)

[Claims] 1. A ring-shaped reaction line in which reaction vessels are arranged and conveyed in a line, a sample injection mechanism for dispensing a sample into the reaction vessel, a reagent injection mechanism for dispensing a reagent into the reaction vessel into which the sample has been injected, From the spectrophotometer, the analysis unit having at least an absorptiometer for measuring the absorbance of the reaction solution in the reaction container and a cleaning mechanism for cleaning the reaction container, and the operation of each unit of the analysis unit according to the worksheet are controlled. And a control unit for calculating the concentration or activity value of the sample by the absorbance of the, the control unit, further, in order to search for a combination of items that cause cross-contamination of the reagent injection mechanism, for a specified number P of items, For (P-1) samples with consecutive sample numbers, all the P-type items are included, and the measurement is started from the first item, and the same measurement order is applied between these (P-1) samples. Union Process that specifies the measurement order of items so that does not appear, and automatically issues a worksheet that specifies only the first item in the next sample following those (P-1) samples. Part, and the measurement result for each item is taken in from the analysis part that performs the analysis operation according to the worksheet issued by the processing part,
An automatic chemical analyzer characterized by comprising a data operation unit for comparing the reference value with the data for determining the presence or absence of cross contamination, and a file unit for holding the determination result as cross contamination data at the time of normal measurement. .