PT - JOURNAL ARTICLE AU - Antonio La Gioia AU - Maurizio Fumi AU - Fabiana Fiorini AU - Paola Pezzati AU - Fiamma Balboni AU - Maria Bombara AU - Alessandra Marini AU - Ylenia Pancione AU - Leonardo Solarino AU - Elisa Marchese AU - Silvia Sale AU - Vincenzo Rocco AU - Marcello Fiorini TI - Short preheating at 41°C leads to a red blood cells count comparable to that in RET channel of Sysmex analysers in samples showing cold agglutination AID - 10.1136/jclinpath-2017-204954 DP - 2018 Mar 13 TA - Journal of Clinical Pathology PG - jclinpath-2017-204954 4099 - http://jcp.bmj.com/content/early/2018/03/13/jclinpath-2017-204954.short 4100 - http://jcp.bmj.com/content/early/2018/03/13/jclinpath-2017-204954.full AB - Aims The presence of cold agglutinin in blood samples can cause a spontaneous agglutination of red blood cells (RBCs) when low temperature occurs. This phenomenon causes a spurious lowering of RBC count on the automated haematological analysers that are detected by incongruous values (≥370 g/L) of the mean cellular haemoglobi concentration (MCHC). A preheating at 37°C can remove the RBC agglutination generally resulting in a reliable count. It has been reported that the same result can be reached by using the optical reticulocyte (RET) channel of Sysmex analysers where the RBC count is not influenced by the presence of cold agglutinin. This study aims to evaluate these data in a larger population, with regard to environmental conditions on Sysmex analysers. We have also evaluated the influence of different thermal pretreatments on the RBC count.Methods This study was performed on 96 remnants of peripheral blood samples (48 with MCHC in normal range and 48 with MCHC>370 g/L) which have been analysed in different preanalytical conditions on the Sysmex analysers.Results A preheating of samples at 41°C for 1 min leads to a reversibility of the cold agglutination comparable to the one observed in the RET channel and yields better results compared with 37°C for 2 hours.Conclusions None of described procedures assure the complete cold agglutination reversibility in every case. Consequently, since the haematological analysers not yet provide reliable parameters to confirm the complete resolution of agglutination, further verification of RBC count accuracy needs to be performed.