13 May 2024 (Monday) - Watch and Wait (!)

#LearningMonday… I hate hashtags with a passion. But the Learning Monday thing is good.

Given that photo it looked like PK deficiency… but the options given were all a tad radical so I plumped for watch and wait… the haemolysis can get less of a problem with age.

And I was right to do so…

 

6 May 2024 (Monday) - EHA Quiz

Every Monday I see a post on Facebook from the European Hematology Association about their “learning Monday”. There’s a photos and a question… and I never bother with it because I know I will forget all about it and never come back for the answer.

Today I took the radical step of actually reading what they had written, and I saw that by clicking one link I could get instant feedback…

 

In which of the listed diseases is a raised basophil count important? CML!

I clicked that link…

“The correct answer is: Chronic myeloid leukemia

Explanation

The cells depicted above are basophils. One criterion of chronic myeloid leukemia in the accelerated phase is the increase of basophils over 20% in the peripheral blood.

Ref:

Baccarani M, Deininger MW, Rosti G, et al. European LeukemiaNet recommendations for the management of chronic myeloid leukemia: 2013. Blood. 2013;122(6):872-884. doi:10.1182/blood-2013-05-501569”

I shall do these little exercises more often…

19 February 2024 (Monday) - European Hematology Association Update

On the one hand following the European Hematology Association’s Facebook feed is a good move as they send out things like this. On the other hand what with the vagaries of Facebook, there’s very little point in doing a morphology quiz on-line as when the answer comes out, the Facebook algorithms will decide to show me pictured of Lego or dogs instead…

In this instance platelet clumping should warrant performing  blood count on a citrated sample.