Automated Hematology Analyzers in Diagnosis of Plasmodium vivax Malaria: an Adjunct to Conventional Microscopy

Malaria is one of the most pervasive parasitic diseases ever known to mankind affecting nearly 300 million people every year. The need for rapid diagnosis of malaria in tropical and subtropical malaria endemic areas is on the rise. In this study, we evaluated the usefulness of hematology autoanalyzers, Sysmex XE-2100 & XT-2000i in the presumptive diagnosis of malaria. Our study shows that abnormalities in WBC/BASO scattergram when combined with presence of thrombocytopenia had a high sensitivity and positive predictive value in the presumptive diagnosis of Plasmodium vivax (P.vivax) malaria.