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Updated: Aug 14, 2026
Counting Human Neural Stem Cells
Published on: August 22, 2007
An evaluation of the cell-dyn 3200 for counting cells in cerebrospinal and other body fluids
J Andrews1, E Setran, L McDonnel
1Department of Laboratory Medicine, University of Washington, Seattle, Washington 98195-7110, USA. jandrews@u.washington.edu
Insights
The Cell-Dyn 3200 (CD 3200) accurately counts white blood cells (WBC) and red blood cells (RBC) in cerebrospinal fluid (CSF) and body fluids, significantly reducing manual cell counts. This automated method offers a lower reportable range and requires less sample volume than comparable instruments.
Area of Science:
- Clinical laboratory science
- Hematology
- Diagnostic technology
Background:
- Manual cell counting using hemocytometers is the reference method for cerebrospinal fluid (CSF) and body fluid analysis.
- Automated cell counters aim to improve efficiency and accuracy in these analyses.
- The Cell-Dyn 3200 (CD 3200) is a potential automated solution for body fluid analysis.
Purpose of the Study:
- To compare the performance of the Cell-Dyn 3200 (CD 3200) for white blood cell (WBC) and red blood cell (RBC) counts against the hemocytometer reference method.
- To evaluate the CD 3200's accuracy, linearity, and precision for total nucleated cell (TNC) and RBC counts in CSF and other body fluid specimens.
- To assess the potential for reducing manual cell counting workload using the CD 3200.
Main Methods:
- Ninety-six CSF and 65 body fluid specimens were analyzed using both the CD 3200 and manual hemocytometer methods.
- Linearity and precision of the CD 3200 for TNC and RBC counts were assessed.
- Correlation analyses (r2 values) were performed to compare CD 3200 results with manual reference counts across various concentration ranges.
Main Results:
- The CD 3200 demonstrated excellent correlation with manual TNC counts for CSF (r2 = 0.9867) and body fluids (r2 = 0.9955).
- Acceptable linearity and precision were observed for both TNC and RBC counts.
- Automated RBC counts could be reliably reported at > or = 0.003 x 10(12)/L, with good agreement with manual counts (r2 = 0.9893 for CSF, r2 = 0.9960 for body fluids).
- The CD 3200 offers a lower reportable range and requires a smaller sample volume compared to other automated counters.
Conclusions:
- The Cell-Dyn 3200 (CD 3200) is a reliable automated method for counting WBC and RBC in CSF and body fluids.
- Implementation of the CD 3200 can significantly reduce the need for manual cell counting, decreasing workload from hundreds to tens of counts.
- The instrument's advantages include a smaller sample volume and no requirement for special preparation, reagents, or software.
Abstract:
This study compared the white blood cell (WBC) and red blood cell (RBC) counts obtained with the Cell-Dyn 3200 (CD 3200) with results obtained by hemocytometer, the reference method for counting cerebrospinal fluid (CSF) and other body fluid specimens. Ninety-six CSF and 65 body fluid specimens were evaluated. Background counts were maintained on the CD 3200 at 0.001 x 10(9)/L and 0.00 x 10(12)/L for WBC and RBC counts, respectively. Linearity and precision were acceptable for both the total nucleated cell (TNC) count and the RBC count. The CD 3200 WBC optical count was correlated with the TNC count obtained by the manual reference method for CSF specimens across the range of 0 x 10(9 )/L to 7.863 x 10(9)/L (r2 = 0.9867) and for body fluid specimens across the range of 0 x 10(9)/L to 14.0 x 10(9)/L (r2 = 0.9955). An r2 value of 0.9016 was obtained for the 82 CSF specimens with manual TNC counts of <0.200 x 10(9)/L. Analysis of the CSF and body fluid specimens indicated that automated RBC counts could be reported at > or = 0.003 x 10(12)/L. In this study, 7 CSF and 30 body fluid specimens had RBC counts of >0.003 x 10(12)/L, and there was good agreement with manual RBC counts, with r2 values of 0.9893 and 0.9960 obtained for CSF and other body fluids, respectively. The CD 3200 in our experience has a lower reportable range than the ranges of most automated cell counters reported in the literature. In contrast to the only other instrument with comparable reportable ranges, the CD 3200 requires a smaller sample volume without any special sample preparation, reagents, or software. By using the CD 3200 with our laboratory-specific rules for agreement between duplicate counts, we would be able to reduce our manual CSF specimen counts from 192 TNC and 192 RBC counts to 2 TNC and 178 RBC counts. For body fluid specimens, our manual counts would be reduced from 130 TNC and 130 RBC counts to 10 TNC and 4 RBC counts.
