Point of Care Testings (POCT) are used whenever the laboratory analysis is not available or the analysis result should be obtained quickly. POCTs with comparable performances to laboratory analyzers are usually more expensive and are based on more complex methods that require equipment and laboratory conditions to be carried out. Although these are widespread in medical practices and laboratories in the western world, they are hardly available in emerging and developing countries due to the high costs and the lack of infrastructure. These devices are also unsuitable for use at the point of care or at home because of the cost, size and complexity of the operation.
A cost-effective analysis, which can also be carried out without any technical equipment and which does not pose any challenge to the layperson, can hardly be found alongside the LFA. If you then take into account that the LFA has hardly any requirements for transportation and storage (as it can be kept for 2 years at up to 30 ° C) and can be transported in every pocket, you are pretty close to the perfect point of care device. The number of companies that expand their portfolio by the lateral flow assay or otherwise benefit from this technology (components, suppliers, LFA reader systems, marketing of LFA products) is increasing steadily, which illustrates the high market acceptance of the lateral flow assay.
In addition, the LFA enables sensitive and specific detection and can be combined with a wide variety of reader technologies that make the LFA a modern, robust and powerful analysis method.