Towards a Point-of-Care Test of CD4⁺ T Lymphocyte Concentrations for Immune Status Monitoring with Magnetic Flow...

For the treatment of human immunodeficiency virus (HIV)-infected patients, the regular assessment of the immune status is indispensable. The quantification of CD4⁺ T lymphocytes in blood by gold standard optical flow cytometry is not point-of-care testing (POCT) compatible. This incompatibility is due to unavoidable pre-analytics, expensive and bulky optics with limited portability, and complex workflow integration. Here, we propose a non-optical, magnetic flow cytometry (MFC) workflow that offers effortless integration opportunities, including minimal user interaction, integrated sample preparation and up-concentration, and miniaturization. Furthermore, we demonstrate immunomagnetic CD4⁺ T lymphocyte labeling in whole blood with subsequent quantification using sheath-less MFC. Showing linearity over two log scales and being largely unimpaired by hematocrit, evidence is provided for POCT capabilities of HIV patients.