. 2021 Mar 23;118(4):1004–1019. doi: 10.1093/cvr/cvab117

Table 1.

Pre-analytical variables in translational cardiovascular research

Variable	Applicability to translational cardiovascular research	References
(1) Post-mortem interval	The time between death and sample collection and appropriate storage	^23–25
(2) Anti-coagulants	The effects of anti-coagulants can present themselves in a number of ways in translational research. Many cardiovascular patients are administered drugs such as heparin or warfarin, which not only affects blood clotting but can also interfere with downstream molecular applications such as cDNA synthesis Anti-coagulant agents including EDTA and citrate are also used in the preparation of plasma, serum or white blood cells	²⁶ ^, ²⁷
(3) Pre-processing interval	The time between sample extraction and processing (in the case of plasma, serum or white blood cell isolation) or storage (e.g. freezing cardiac samples)	²⁸
(4) Processing method	The protocol used for extraction of plasma, serum or white blood cells isolation
(5) Samples storage	Receptacles for liquid biopsies and solid tissue can affect preservation of RNA and DNA (e.g. cryo-tubes pre-coated with anti-coagulants such as EDTA or citrate or nuclease free tubes)	²⁹ ^, ³⁰