Rapid flow cytometric test for the diagnosis of hereditary spherocytosis and its relevance to clinical severity

The causes of non-immunehereditary hemolyticanaemia include enzymopathy, hemoglobinopathy, abnormal cation transport and membranopathy. Hereditary spherocytoris [HS] is the most common membranopathy. In this study a new flow cytometic test measures the fluorescence in tensity of intact red cells labeled with eosin -5- maliernide. The dye reacts covalentily with lys-430 on the first extracellular loop of band 3 protein. In this study, red cells from patients with HS produced a greater degree of reduction of mean channel fluorescence [MCF] readings than those for other patients groups with other causes of anaemia and normal controls. The MCF for spherocytic patients was 20.4 +/- 5.2 as compared to the control group whose MCF was 35.9 +/- 2.6. The MCF readings of other patients groups included in the study were for thalassaemia patient [39.8 +/- 2.2], glucose -6- phosphate dehydrogenase deficiency patients [34.8 +/- 1.9] iron deficiency anaemia patient [30.25 +/- 1.2], autoimmune hemolytic anaemia patients [32.5 +/- 1.7] and chronic renal failure patients [34.6 +/- 1.7]. All these groups of patients gave MCF readings that were higher than those of HS. Thus the dye method proved to be a reliable and speedy diagnostic test [2 hours from sample collection to result] for the diagnosis of hereditary spherocytosis in routine hematology

Evaluation of qualitative and quantitative platelet defects using flow cytometry

The diagnosis of platelet defects and inappropriate platelet activation is associated with some difficulties. Flowcytometry has been reported to be ideally suited for studying several clinical aspects of platelet pathophysiology and platelet function. In this study, the methodology and clinical utility of reticulated platelet analysis, platelet associated immunoglobulin and platelet expression of P-selectin [CD62] and glycoprotein IIbIIIa [CD41] in some platelet disorders were explored. The study included a total of 72 cases classified into 35 cases of ITP, ten cases of ITP in remission, seven cases of Glanzmanns thrombasthenia, six cases with aplastic anemia and 14 age matched controls. Data showed that flowcytometric analysis can be used as a reliable measure of important diagnostic aspects of qualitative and quantitative platelet disorders and it can be used to assess circulating activated platelets