A Hematologist’s best friend is a slide maker. The smears are all uniform and have a great feather-edge, perfect for differentials and estimates. As I work at a clinic lab, we do not have one.
This means blood smears are made by hand.
This is a learned art. And after many years without practice, it tends to disappear. One starts out early, practicing a lot. Slide after slide. It’s a fairly straight-forward technique, but one that has to be mastered to be of any use. After placing a drop of blood on two slides, you use the end of one slide to essentially “smear” the blood. The same is done for the other slide.
When I was in school, the professor gave us each a box of slides and some tubes of blood and said “go to it”. Amidst the gentle tinkling sound of glass and my friends, I made slides, lots of them. Lots of crappy ones. We probably went through 3 boxes each, trying to make the perfect slide.
And then your technique is perfected. You are confident. You can make slides that aren’t useless.
And then… you get a slide maker. What a wonderful invention! Never again shall I have to make slides. Oh, and they are so perfect! And uniform!
And. And. And…
Now I occasionaly make them, by hand, and my perfection is only 50%. There is always the one of the pair that is crooked, off to one side. Still usable, but far from ideal. I don’t think I can ask for anything more.
It’s kind of like life… you can practice and practice, but there is never 100% perfection. That is what makes every day unique.
December 29, 2006 at 4:02 pm
Check me out…I’ve become a blogger!
February 25, 2008 at 12:35 pm
[...] also thought it fitting to revisit my blood smear post, being that many people are finding their way here through that one. To update some of the [...]