Morphology and Cytochemistry Laboratory

The department is part of the Labs Complement UHKT. It continuously advocates an independent and impartial assessment of the professional competence according to the ČSN EN ISO 15189 standard, the application of which is verified by the Czech Accreditation Institute. The test methods within the scope of accreditation are defined by the Annex to the Certificate of Accreditation in the current version, which is available on the website.

The laboratory routinely examines blood counts including instrumental and manual leukocyte budget, cytological evaluation of peripheral blood smears, bone marrow aspirate, as well as numerical and cytological evaluation of body fluids (cerebrospinal fluid, pleural fluid, ascites, bronchoalveolar lavage fluid) and determination of erythrocyte sedimentation rate. A total of twelve cytochemical examinations allow accurate cytological diagnosis of bone marrow aspirate smears. The laboratory also carries out consular examinations of bone marrow aspirate (2nd reading) within its competence, also in statim mode. It cooperates closely with Institute of Pathology and Molecular Medicine at the 2nd Faculty of Medicine of the Charles University on histological findings and in establishing the final diagnosis.

The laboratory is equipped with two blood image analysers (SYSMEX XN 10 and SYSMEX XN20), a smear and staining machine, and digital morphology equipment. The XN20 analyzer measures and evaluates blood count parameters other than conventional analyzers, such as immature platelets, which are important in the differential diagnosis of thrombocytopenia. Smearing and staining are performed on the SP10i machine. The cytological evaluation of peripheral blood smears is routinely performed using digital instrument (DI60), which work on the principle of digital data transmission (photographs of individual cells); the morphology of erythrocytes and platelets is also evaluated using images.

The laboratory staff routinely provides postgraduate training in morphology as part of the postgraduate education in haematology.

The services of the laboratory are also used by scientists in their projects (measurement of parameters on the blood count analyzer, cytological analysis of slides).

The laboratory successfully fulfils the conditions of external quality assessment every year; it uses samples from SEKK Ltd. for the blood image analyzer differential cycle, microscopic evaluation of peripheral blood smear, reticulocytes on the analyzer, bone marrow smear and peripheral blood smear in photography. It is one of the ten reference laboratories (expert group) for microscopic analysis of peripheral blood smear.