FishburneTabs®SC - a saliva collection research tool
FishburneTabs®SC were created as a consistent clinical diagnostic and research platform that addresses confounding collection issues of saliva quality and variability. However, they also were designed, as with the FishburneTabs®OH, to appeal to patients and support compliance.
Conceived in the Covid pandemic, FishburneTabsSC were developed when saliva experts came together to address the mounting problem of identifying active disease. Drs Athena Papas and Clifton Carey, who had worked with the FishburneTabsOH, recognized that this paper device could be used. At the time, they approached several researchers that included Dr. Charles Mace, an experienced chemist with a specialty in dry blood sampling to tackle the problem. Ingenious and insightful, Mace’s result used dried saliva samples collected on the FishburneTabs that yielded colorimetric identification of Covid virus.
FishburneTabsSC are intended to engage the researcher’s imagination as an environmentally sustainable, patient-friendly, and cost-effective platform on which new assays and approaches can be developed. The developers continue to welcome innovation in saliva research.
FAQs
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Though previously only available to the research community in the US, the FishburneTabs®SC are newly available through Salvivo, LTD in both the US and the UK.
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Every effort has been made to make the FishburneTabs®SC acceptable, appealing and easy to use for subjects, researchers and staff. Most notably, the developers addressed our human impulse to be repelled by saliva in liquid form by making each device an amusing shape and ensuring that the saliva sample is not visible as a fluid at collection.
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Varied and/or slow unrepeatable collection:
FishburneTabsSC’s 1-3 minute collection time and minimal patient impact allow swift test repetition. Therefore, researchers may ask questions regarding variability in granular time sequences, even a minute or less.
Variable viscosity:
FishburneTabsSC minimize limitations due to variability of viscosity since absorbent paper removes water while molecules of interest remain on the surface.
Consistent collection of fluid across subjects:
Major saliva glands are known to produce saliva of differing composition. Consistent placement of the FishburneTabsSC on the lingual surface of the tongue helps to ensure each subject is providing a similar mixed from each sample taken
Patient & staff reluctance:
Liquid saliva is innately unappealing. The FishburneTabs platform has been created to engage and appeal to all people encountering them. Since saliva in a liquid form is never seen nor touched, resistance to use is minimized.
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Saliva water content can be allowed to evaporate after removal from the mouth. A new study has shown that techniques developed for dried blood samples can be translated to saliva with the use of the Fishburne®SC.
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FishburneTabs®SC are designed as a research tool and as such do not have a demanding or prescribed method for collection. Due to flexibility of time increments in which the FishburneTabs®SC may be employed, FishburneTabs®SC may be utilized by several industries, including but not limited to: Biomedical, Clinical & Dental Research; Nutrition/Food, Wine & Spirits; and Veterinary. Therefore, populations of interest may differ substantially.
For biomedical and dental research, the manufacturer recommends their directions be used as a baseline. Rigorous methodology and consistent implementation of a defined protocol within a well-defined population of study is highly encouraged.
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Paper-based and incinerable, FishburneTabs®SC add no disposal cost to the clinic, laboratory or the environment.