Drug interference with laboratory value interpretation: A review.

In patients receiving medication, laboratory determinations can be adversely affected by drug-induced physiologic side effects and/or direct analytic interference by the drug or its metabolites. Drugs administered to alleviate an illness can induce physiologic abnormalities in one or more of the following systems: hepatic, hemostatic, renal, hematologic, pancreatic, muscular and osteal, with the result that correct diagnosis is obscured or proper monitoring is prevented. Drug interference can also occur directly in analytic laboratory assays, producing falsely elevated or decreased values.