Impact of albumin carbamylation on immunoturbidimetric measurement of urinary albumin.

Urinary albumin is one of the main markers used in clinical practice to assess kidney damage. It is usually measured in laboratories through immunological assays, but these assays may not detect molecules with conformational changes, such as carbamylated albumin/proteins. Therefore, this study aimed to investigate the impact of albumin carbamylation on the measurement of albuminuria by an immunoturbidimetric assay. The addition of the carbamylating agent to PBS buffer and urine pool promoted a lower quantification of albumin measured by the immunoturbidimetric method, indicating that this process may be responsible for an underestimation of the results in clinical practice.