Patient-centric, at-home, dried blood collection can increase compliance, reduce cohort size, decrease shipping costs, and open the door for broader applications of affinity proteomics. Dried blood samples from 16 individuals, collected by Tasso M20 "smart" devices, were analyzed by the SomaScan Assay using conditions modified for this new matrix. These assay results were compared to plasma and serum from the same donors. The cross-section of proteins that can be measured in both plasma and dried blood was determined. Complete blood counts (CBCs) were also taken from these donors. We generated models to predict these counts based on SomaScan Assay measurements. Over 800 proteins can be measured in both plasma and DBS. These proteins are actively secreted by cells or found on cellular surfaces. The remainder of the SomaScan Assay menu contains information on the cellular component of whole blood. Models generated from DBS data can more accurately predict complete blood counts than those generated from plasma.
Smith et al. (Mon,) studied this question.