Patent ID: 7267798

Claim:
A multi-analyte diagnostic system for use with a computer, the diagnostic system comprising: a flow analyzer including a substantially co-planar optical assembly having at least one light source and at least one optical detector, said flow analyzer being communicable with the computer; and a memory medium readable by the computer and storing computer instructions, the instructions including: processing a biological sample using said flow analyzer, wherein said processing instruction includes: (a) exposing a pooled population of subsets of particles to the biological sample, the particles in each subset having (i) at least one classification parameter that distinguishes the particles of one subset from those of another subset, and (ii) a reactant specific for each of at least one analyte of interest; and (b) passing the exposed pooled population of subsets of particles through an examination zone; and determining a presence and quantity of each of said at least one analyte of interest in the biological sample substantially simultaneously to said processing step, wherein said determining instruction comprises assessing the identity and quantity of each of said at least one analyte of interest, if present, in the sample by substantially contemporaneously: (a) collecting data relating to the at least one classification parameter, including particle subset data on fluorescence emission intensities; (b) collecting data relating to a presence or absence of a complex formed between the reactant and an analyte of interest specific to the reactant, including analyte data on fluorescence emission intensities, wherein the particle subset data and the analyte data exhibit spectral overlap; (c) classifying, without relying exclusively, if at all, on differences in particle size, each particle according to its subset, wherein said classifying step includes reducing the spectral overlap sufficiently to identify said each particle according to its subset; and (d) quantifying an amount of complex associated with each subset.