Advanced Clinical Pathology

Overview:

This is an interactive session that will review blood smear evaluation and present challenging case studies that will require the attendee to identify hematological changes on blood smears of veterinary patients. This is an important component of the Complete Blood Count as it allows for identification of significant hematologic abnormalities. In conjunction with automated CBC data given by your point of care analyzer, the blood smear evaluation provides information on cell morphology not reported by the analyzer and confirms abnormal findings or errors reported by the analyzer.

Learning Objectives:

• Review indications for blood smear evaluations in the age of automated complete blood count analyzers and outside laboratories. Correct counts and morphology are not given by the analyzers and are needed to determine the patient’s response to inflammation and infection and to properly diagnose metabolic and immune disease and parasitic infections.
• Review the procedure and steps in performing the blood smear evaluation.
• Examine and apply findings of blood smears to determine WBC count estimate, WBC differential count (WBC identification), WBC morphology, RBC morphology, platelet count estimate and morphology, and hemo-parasite and artifact identification.
• Knowledge and identification of abnormal findings are important to recognize and can change the course of treatment for the patient.
• Apply knowledge gained from blood smear evaluation review to analyze case studies, using history, physical exam findings, complete blood count results from automated analyzers compared to blood smear evaluations to reach a diagnosis.