Evaluation of the peripheral blood smear (PBS) is an essential diagnostic test in current medical practice. We aimed to evaluate the use of digital microscopy for the examination of PBS as an option to provide expert interpretation to remote sites and in "on-call" situations.
We collected 100 Wright-Giemsa-stained PBS slides representing normal and abnormal findings seen at a community-based hospital. Four hematopathologists independently evaluated the cases using conventional light and digital microscopy.
When comparing digital vs light microscopy, most of the cellular features evaluated showed at least a moderate degree of agreement in at least three of the reviewers. Discrepancies in final diagnosis were identified in a minority of the cases, most of which were attributed to the poorer resolution of digital microscopy at high magnification (×400).
These results support the limited use of digital microscopy for evaluation and triage of peripheral blood smears as a practical option to obtain expert opinion in locations where experienced staff is not available on site. Our results indicate that while digital microscopy is well suited for basic triage of these blood smears, limitations in quality of imaging at higher magnification as well as large file size may limit its utility in certain settings and situations.
This research output has an Altmetric Attention Score of 8. This is our high-level measure of the quality and quantity of online attention that it has received. This Attention Score, as well as the ranking and number of research outputs shown below, was calculated when the research output was last mentioned on 18 May 2021.
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#6,074,539
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#7
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Altmetric has tracked 32,375,021 research outputs across all sources so far. Compared to these this one has done well and is in the 81st percentile: it's in the top 25% of all research outputs ever tracked by Altmetric.
So far Altmetric has tracked 5,044 research outputs from this source. They typically receive a little more attention than average, with a mean Attention Score of 6.7. This one has done well, scoring higher than 85% of its peers.
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We're also able to compare this research output to 47 others from the same source and published within six weeks on either side of this one. This one has done well, scoring higher than 85% of its contemporaries.
