24 June 2024 (Monday) - Schistocytes

Clare’s done some science again. She’s rather good at it. Schistocyte counts… You can see the ICSH recommendations on the matter by clicking here.
I won’t repeat what Clare has said – she’s said it far better than I could, and you can read it by clicking here anyway. 

But I will make an observation… what is an acceptable measurement of uncertainty? Am I being utterly unreasonable in thinking that in numerical terms a schistocyte count won’t be a million miles from a parasitaemia count? Look at the most recent malaria NEQAS – we made the answer 0.2. Plenty of other people made the answer double or triple that number. What is an acceptable measurement of uncertainty?

20 November 2023 (Monday) - XBarM Analysis

Clare’s done some more science…  XbarM analysis… for the most part tells you that the blood samples going through your analyser now are from a different clinic to those that went through half an hour ago…

 

Clare explains it in more detail here.

26 September 2023 (Tuesday) - Unstable Haemoglobin

 

Clare’s done some more science – how the Sysmex XN copes (or doesn’t) with unstable haemoglobin.

Mind you in over forty years I’ve never knowingly seen a case of unstable haemoglobin…

25 October 2022 (Tuesday) - Malaria 2022

The British Society for Haematology has published guidance on the laboratory diagnosis of malaria. Clare’s done a little review of them and of how she implements them. You can read it by clicking here.

I’ll just make the observation that whilst it is patently obvious that one hundred per cent compliance with the guidelines is what is expected, in the New World Order of modern laboratory management one has to explicitly say this…

14 July 2022 (Thursday) - Storing Energy

Clare did some science whilst I wasn’t looking. It seems that tumour cells store energy in ways that non-cancerous cells don’t which gives them an advantage.

I wonder if there I any way that this ability can be spotted in the laboratory as a prelude to targeting the tumour cells? Might this be what we are doing in the labs in a few years’ time?

19 May 2022 (Thursday) - XN Scattergram Plots

That Clare has done some science again. At first sight it might seem a tad simplistic, but think again. Putting the correct XN cell cloud in the right place on a scattergram… I would seriously have to think this one through… and I’d challenge anyone who would claim it was easy.