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The importance of schistocytes in a patient in VA-ECMO

Marco P Barros Pinto1

  • 1Hospital Santa Maria, Centro Hospitalar Universitário Lisboa Norte, EPE, Av. Prof. Egas Moniz, 1649-028 Lisbon, Portugal; Faculdade de Medicina, Universidade de Lisboa, Lisbon, Portugal.

Morphologie : Bulletin De L'Association Des Anatomistes
|April 5, 2024
PubMed

The presence of schistocytes can be responsible for spurious thrombocytosis and spuriously low red blood count (RBC). The hemoglobin concentration will be correct (as the method usually used, destroys the red cells and converts a substantial proportion of the hemoglobin to a stable pigment) but mean corpuscular hemoglobin (MCH) is falsely high. The platelets and RBC histograms of the full blood count analyzers play an important role in the identification of schistocytes and must be carefully analyzed before reporting the previously full blood count parameters. In patients in ECMO, where can be expected the presence of a small number of schistocytes, this evaluation is particularly important to avoid wrong clinical decisions.

Keywords:
SchistocytesVA-ECMO

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