nagel3 wrote:I need to convert clinical lab data units into the appropriate unit possibilities according to the data accumalated. An example is mg/dL qty into mmol/L. OR U/L into g/L OR mmol/L into ukat/L
these combinations are a few that are constantly difficult to resolve since minimal unit information is published on these topics.
Nagel,
Converting to and from any molar value (mmol, µmol, etc.) is exceedingly difficult. The mole is one of the seven fundamental units in the metric system, and perhaps the least understood.
The key is avogado's number, which is an honorary name attached to the calculated value of the number of atoms, molecules, etc. in a gram mole of any chemical substance. Avogadro's number is 6.022e23.
The mass in grams of a substance, that equals one mole is often called its molar mass, and the units are grams/mole or g/mol. For example, aspirin has a molecular mass of 180 grams. Therefore if we massed out exactly 180 grams of aspirin we would have Avogadro's number of aspirin molecules (6.022e23) or one mole of asprin.
In making any conversion from or to moles, therefore, we must know what the molar mass, or molecular weight, of the substance is. As there are an awful lot of chemicals, blood fractions, and medications that people might want to convert values for, making a conversion chart for all of them would be quite a daunting task.
You might want to take a look at another post I made, at
http://www.convert-me.com/en/bb/viewtopic.php?t=212 where I discussed converting mg/l to mmols/l.