Blood film
making is of great importance to haematology because it forms a daily routine
tool of diagnosis in haematology laboratory. Blood film is significant in:
MICROSCOPIC EXAMINATIONS FOR DIAGNOSTIC CELL COUNTS
SUCH AS:
·
Rough estimation
of cell counts:
Under
the low power (10x) objective, the RBC’s appear as small, round, reddish orange
bodies and are the major cell types. Scattered among the RBC's are the white
cells. The white cells are nucleated and their nuclei stain in shades of purple
and the cytoplasm’s stain in different colours, depending on the type of cell.
In an area where the cells are evenly spread in a single layer, 5 white blood
cells in low a power field are roughly equal to 1000 red cells / cu.mm (1x109
cells /L). At least 5 low power fields should be counted to average the
estimate of white cell count.
·
Evaluation of
platelet count
·
White blood cell
count (Ochei
and Kolhatkar, 2007).