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Case of the Week 16

The following peripheral blood smear is from a 42 year old woman from Venezuela. Identification? (CLICK ON IMAGE TO ENLARGE)

Answer to Case 16

Answer: Trypanosoma cruzi
It is important not to forget about these extracellular parasites when screening a blood smear for malaria parasites. This image shows the motile trypomastigotes of T. cruzi. Note that these organisms are approximately 2-3 RBCs in length, and contain a nucleus and kinetoplast (below, arrow). T. cruzi can be most readily distinguished from the trypomastigotes of Trypanosoma brucei by the size of the kinetoplast; the former is much larger and appears to bulge from the organism.

An interesting tidbit: Contrary to expected, the kinetoplast is at the posterior end of the organism, while the flagella is at the anterior end. The trypomastigotes move with their flagella at their front.

Thanks to the four folks who wrote in with the answer – all correct!

Mobile Phone-Based Light Microscopy and Image Analysis

A group of researchers at UC Berkeley has developed a portable, mobile phone-based light microscopy system (PLoS) for rapid computer-assisted analysis of clinical specimens in parts of the world where quality lab equipment or trained personnel are not available.

Parasite Case of the Week 15

Welcome back to the Parasite Case of the Week!  I post a new case every Monday, along with the answer to the previous week’s case.  Here is our new case for this week. Examination of an unstained muscle biopsy pressed between 2 glass slides revealed the following:

Answer to Parasite Case of the Week 14

Parasite Case of the Week 14 can be viewed HERE. The correct answer for this case is: Entamoeba histolytica/E. dispar Note that I’ve listed 2 separate protozoan parasites, separated by a slash. It is not possible to distinguish these organisms by morphologic grounds unless you see ingested RBCs in the trophozoites which are strongly suggestive [...]

Hemepath

I am officially well into my PGY-2 year and my current rotation is Hemepath for 3 months.  It’s been a bit of a shift from the mentality of Surgical Pathology, but the workflow is similar to that other, “foreign” world.  I enjoy the types of cases we get to work up and actually have found [...]