23 July 2026 (Thursday) - Pappenheimer Bodies

I saw some Pappenheimer bodies last week, so I took photos, and have updated my little atlas with the piccies. To see it click on this link and then click on “Pappenheimer bodies” in the list on the left hand side.

 

I’ve used a new page format for this entry… if only to make it look like the thing is a work in progress (which it actually is!)

 

2 May 2026 (Saturday) - Unexpected Thrombocytosis

I was sitting in the garden enjoying the Bank Holiday sunshine when my phone beeped. A colleague wanted my opinion on a blood film…

A sample taken in the community had been somehow left in the sunshine, the red cells had cooked and broken up, and the analyser had counted the fragments as platelets.

Here’s my (updated) take on the matter…

5 February 2026 (Thursday) - Yuk (!)

I updated my atlas with something I saw down the microscope yesterday. Click here, then click on loa loa

28 January 2026 (Wednesday) - Levetiracetam

 I saw an interesting case today. Clearly an iron-deficiency anaemia. They are quite common. But this one was in someone who was on Levetiracetam. It’s an anticonvulsant which whilst supposedly not causing iron deficiency, it is recommended that people on that medication should take iron supplements.

I’ve updated my atlas to include this case, and here’s some expert opinion on the matter

13 January 2026 (Tuesday) - Pseudo Pelger Huet Anomaly

An interesting case today… a massive neutrophilia with some Pelger Huet cells…

I’ve updated the page in my atlas – click here, and then look for “Pelger Huet Anomaly” in the links on the left hand side…

7 January 2026 (Wednesday) - Atlas Update

The rules say that if and when I get called up for audit, only CPD work done in the last two years will be assessed. Which is something of a nuisance because I’ve put a load of effort into a personal atlas of things I’ve seen over the years.

Is it cheeky to do a major overhaul of the thing and claim that as recent CPD? That’s been my CPD project for the last few days… I’ve found that the formatting isn’t what it might be, and some of the references now go to dead links.

Well… I shall claim it as CPD… what’s the worst that can happen? An assessor will say that it isn’t current and I’ll have to submit something else…

30 December 2025 (Tuesday) - Basophilic Stippling

I saw some basophilic stippling down the microscope… so I took a photo and updated the page on my atlas.

I really need to go through that atlas and re-format it…

5 May 2025 (Monday) - Pelger-Huet Anomaly

I saw what looked like a case of Pelger Huet anomaly last Friday. I took a rather poor photo, and then… I discovered that many years ago I started a page on my atlas on the matter but never actually published it.

So I wrote it up and published it. You can see it by clicking here and clicking on the relevant bit.

If you click there and look at the relevant bit you will see that one photo is far better than the other. Back in the day I had a camera attachment that I stuck into the microscope. I need to get another of those.

30 April 2025 (Wednesday) - Iron Deficient H.E.

An interesting case… an iron-deficient case of hereditary elliptocytosis. There’s more about it in my atlas…

28 April 2025 (Monday) - Eosinophils Page

I created a page on eosinophils in my Atlas today. A very basic page… so basic that there’s not actually anything at all on there. But it is something… it’s a start. I shall work on it.. and work on the rest of the atlas too…

25 April 2025 (Friday) - Pernicious Anaemia

I saw a case of pernicious anaemia today, so I wrote it up for my atlas. You can see that atlas by clicking here. I’ve not done much with that recently; perhaps I should…

16 May 2024 (Thursday) - Updating My Atlas

If you look on-line there are many atlases of haematology; websites showing all sorts of weird and wonderful things you see down the microscope. Some are rather obscure and you rarely if ever see these things outside of an atlas. Years ago I started one of my own. It’s nothing special, the photos are rather dreadful, but it is all stuff that I have seen myself. You can see the atlas by clicking here (if you feel so inclined).

I spent a little while this morning updating it with things I’ve seen over the last couple of months.

• Basophilic stippling
• Howell Jolly bodies
• May-Hegglin Anomoly
• Mitotic figures

17 January 2023 (Tuesday) -More On-Line Morphology

 

As I cracked on with my Coursera course I had a revelation. Over the years I’ve been working on my own on-line atlas of haematology… it didn’t have a section on cold agglutinins.

It does now.

I’ve now finished the first week of my Coursera course. So far it is rather good. If nothing else it is making me have a far more methodical mindset when peering down the microscope.

 

Being a cheapskate I’m doing the free version of the course. Coursera have changed how they operate. Back in the day the peer-reviewed exercises came with the free version. Now I have to pay for them. Oh well… I didn’t want my (frankly excellent!) work judged by some newly-qualified newbie anyway…

23 September 2022 (Friday) - Elliptocytosis

I found a new case of hereditary elliptocytosis today. Rather than going blah-blah-blah here reproducing that which you can look up on Wikipedia in minutes, I updated my Atlas of Haematolgy. Call it up by clicking here and click on elliptocytes…

4 September 2022 (Sunday) - Target Cells

Target cells are red blood cells that have more cell membrane than is usual, which causes the cells to look like little targets.

I realised I’d not mentioned them in my atlas… I have now. You can see my atlas by clicking here.