Reading the Blood Film: Shape

What this deck covers

Reading the Blood Film: Shape in twelve illustrated clinical cases with worked explanations – case presentations built around clinical images, radiology, teaching illustrations and real laboratory data, with the reference range beside every value a case quotes. This visual, data-interpretation style of practice suits candidates preparing for MRCPCH AKP in particular, alongside Saudi and Gulf licensing examinations such as the Arab Board, DHA and OMSB. Each case gives you a clinical vignette, four options, the correct answer, and an explanation of why each of the other three is wrong.

The twelve cases, in order

1. A dark spot inside the pale area
2. Round rather than disc-shaped
3. Oval, and all facing one way
4. Curved, with a point at each end
5. A point at one end only
6. Spikes that are not all alike
7. A slit where the pale area should be
8. Cells stacked like coins
9. Clumps rather than stacks
10. More than one shape at once
11. Which shape to lead with
12. Present, or present in how many

What this deck teaches

• Shape is what a counter cannot report. Size and colour both have numbers behind them. Shape has none, which is why a film is the only thing that can answer for it.
• Describe the shape, do not name the cause. Curved with a point at each end, oval and all lying one way, drawn out at one end. Each of those survives a change of diagnosis.
• A sphere has no pale centre because it is not a disc. The colour finding of episode 2 and the shape finding here are the same cell, answered from two directions.
• Regular projections are storage; irregular ones are not. Episode 1’s aged sample grows identical evenly spaced spikes. Differing lengths at irregular intervals is a different finding.
• Arrangement is not shape. Cells stacked face to face in rows, and cells in irregular clumps, are two arrangements of normally shaped cells.
• Lead with the shape most cells share. The striking cell catches the eye and the dominant one carries the information.

Exam pearls from this deck

• Three zones, from the outside in. Describe them and let the cause follow.
• The pale centre is a consequence of the disc. Lose the disc and it goes.

The twelve worked cases in this deck, with the images and the full explanation of every option, are part of Pediatric Case Review membership. See what is included, or start with the free Pediatric Exam Review Sets.

More from this system: all haematology illustrated case decks · haematology board questions for bank-style drilling · the free Pediatric Exam Review Sets · pediatric reference values.