Reference ranges are the most common decision support tool used for interpretation of numerical pathology reports. As laboratory results may be interpreted by comparison with these ranges, the quality of the reference intervals can play as large a role in result interpretation as the quality of the result itself. One of the key inflammatory markers in the progression of atherosclerotic lesions is the level of circulating oxidised low density lipoprotein (oLDL) using a sandwich type EIA. Having

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... reference range that is correct for the target population is important. The manufacturer of the assay had calculated a reference range of 26-117 mU/L for the oLDL assay using only 148 'normal' patients, our data calculated the in-house reference range as 14.4 to 102.7 mU/L with a tolerance interval of 20.5 to 96.8 mU/L for 90% of the population. In this instance there was a slight difference between the manufacturer's range and the calculated inhouse range.