Abstract

LOPARDO, Horacio Angel  and  PINHEIRO, Jose Luis. Comparison between the observation of white blood cells from centrifuged urine smear and the Neubauer chamber. Acta bioquím. clín. latinoam. [online]. 2008, vol.42, n.1, pp.47-51. ISSN 0325-2957.

The current method of centrifuged urine smear was compared to the Neubauer chamber method, using this technique as the gold standard. Their predictive ability for detecting significant bacteriuria was determined. During two months, 2.287 urine cultures were studied. Only 1.153 were evaluable. In 982 samples a comparison between the two microscopic methods could be established. The correlation between them was 96,4%. The sensitivity of the centrifuged urine smear and the Neubauer chamber method was 53.5% and 55.5% respectively. Specificities were 90.7% and 91.4%. Those results pointed out that seeing a significant number of polymorphonuclear neutrophils (PMNs) both in the centrifuged urine smear and in the Neubauer chamber was predictive of significant bacteriuria. On the other hand, absence of PMNs is not an argument for not considering this possibility. Centrifuged urine was equivalent to the Neubauer chamber method in this comparative study.

Keywords : White blood cells; Centrifuged urine; Neubauer chamber; Urine culture; Children.

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