Patent ID: 6630990
Filing Date: 2003-10-07
Classification: G01N

Abstract:
A three-dimensional optical method for determining the volume, V, and hemoglobin content, HC, of individual red blood cells, said method comprising the steps of;a) treating an anti-coagulated whole blood sample with a reagent solution, said solution comprising a sphering agent and a neutrally buffered isotonic saline solution; b) passing a red blood cell isolated from said sample through a light beam directed along an optical path at a selected wave length; c) measuring the resultant magnitude of a first forward angle light scatter signal, a second intermediate angle light scatter signal, and a third side-angle light scatter signal from each cell; d) projecting a three-dimensional coordinate of said light scatter signals from each cell onto a precalibrated three dimensional surface containing grid lines of V and HC; e) determining the values of V and HC by the location of each projected intercept onto said three dimensional grid surface.