Answer: The persistence of crystals in the urine can lead to inflammation of the mucus lining of the bladder and urethra. This can cause clinical signs identical to urinary tract infection, or the subsequent compromised state of the bladder mucosa lead to urinary infections. Chronic urinary crystals can also form bonds with one another, leading to the formation of stones within the bladder. Stone cause severe inflammation of urinary bladder, leading to blood in the urine, pain, and chronic infections. Kidney stones can obstruct the urinary passages and cause severe pain, and bleeding to the patient.Treatment of urinary crystals is accomplished through prescription diets that stablize the urine pH and eliminate dietary factors that lead to crystal formation. Small bladder stones can be treated by dissolution with the appropriate prescription diet like u had mentioned in your question. However, larger stones usually have to be removed surgically, and the patient has to placed on a good prescription diet to prevent their recurrence. Calcium oxylate stones cannot be dissolved with diet and have to be removed surgically. However, effective diets exist to prevent their recurrence. If the crystals do not pass out of the body naturally, the physician may use shock wave treatment. In this treatment, a shock wave focused on the stone from outside the body disintegrates it.
Q2. Refer to Dorene's
Answer:
Common Causes of Urine Discolouration
Brown:
Pathologic causes: Bile pigments,myoglobin
Food and drug causes: Levodopa, metronidazole, nitrofurantoin, some antimalarial agents
Brownish-black:
Pathologic causes: Bile pigments, melanin, methaemoglobin
Food and drug causes: Cascara, levodopa, methyldopa, senna
Green or blue:
Pathologic causes: Pseudomonal UTI, biliverdin
Food and drug causes: Amitriptyline, indigo carmine, IV cimetidine,IV promethazine, methylene blue, triamterene
Orange:
Pathologic causes: Bile pigments
Food and drug causes: Phenothiazines, phenazopyridine
Red:
Pathologic causes: Haematuria, aemoglobinuria, myoglobinuria, porphyria
Food and drug causes: Beets, blackberries, rhubarb Phenolphthalein, rifampicin
Yellow:
Pathologic causes: Concentrated urine (orange to gold in dehydration)
Food and drug causes: Carrots, Cascara
(fyi) Turbidity: Cloudy urine may be due to excess phosphate crystals precipitating in alkaline urine, which is of no clinical significance. However, it can also be seen in pyuria secondary to infection, chyluria (usually secondary to filariasis), hyperuricosuria secondary to a diet high in purine-rich foods, lipiduria and hyperoxaluria. Dorene, hope the above information would have cleared your doubts and also the part on Turbidity.
Q3. Refer to Lizzie's
Answer:
Whenever a Myco test is done, we compare the results to the positive control results. Yes, there is sure a chance for a false positive result to occur if the wells were subjected to agitation.
- Basically, a definite compact button in center of well with a smooth round outer margin indicates a negative result. A definite large ring with firmly agglutinated particles spread within the ring indicates a postive result.
- A specimen showing (-) with Unsensitized particles (at 1:20 final dilution) but demonstrating (+) or more with Sensitized particles (at 1:40 final dilution) is interpreted as positive. The end antibody titre is determined as the final dilution giving a (+) pattern.
- Regardless of the reading of the reaction pattern with Unsensitized particles, a specimen showing (-) with Sensitized Particles (at 1:40 dilution) is interpreted as negative.
Q4. Refer to Sally's
Answer:
hemolytic anemia is a disorder characterized by the premature destruction of red blood cells (rbcs) by the body's natural defenses against invading organisms. Hence, an elevated level of agglutinin will result in the premature destruction of rbcs. Normally, the red blood cells have a life span of approximately 120 days before they are destroyed by the spleen. In individuals with hemolytic anemia, the red blood cells are destroyed prematurely and the rate of production of new cells in the bone marrow can no longer compensate for their loss. The severity of the anemia is determined by the length of time that the red blood cells survive and by the rate at which the bone marrow continues to create new red blood cell production.
(fyi) The immune hemolytic anemias are classified according to the optimal temperature at which the antibodies act to destroy red blood cells. As their names imply, cold antibody hemolytic anemia occurs at temperatures of approximately 0 to 10 degree celsius (temperatures colder than normal body temperature), while warm antibody hemolytic anemia (WAHA) occurs at temperatures of 37 degrees celsius or higher.
Q5. Refer to Jia Hao's
Answer: There are two common types of hCG tests. A qualitative hCG test detects if hCG is present in the blood. A quantitative hCG test (or beta hCG) measures the amount of hCG actually present in the blood. First of all, you have to understand the purposes of both the tests. A qualitative hCG test is done via the commercial test strips to detect if a woman is pregnant in the first place. Quantitative hCG test is done to guage roughly how long has it been since the woman got pregnant.
In my experience at the lab, the manual testing method using the commercial strip is sensitive enough a method to see if the woman is pregnant. This is done at the Microbiolody Lab. On the other hand, at the Serology lab, we carry out the quantitative hCG test (or beta hCG) whichmeasures the amount of hCG actually present in the blood using the Immunolite Analyzer. For that, we do use the patients' serum for testing. This, like I mentioned, is used to roughly guage how long has the woman been pregnant.
(fyi) hCG levels during pregnancy:
hCG levels in weeks from LMP (gestational age) :
3 weeks LMP: 5 - 50 mIU/ml
4 weeks LMP: 5 - 426 mIU/ml
5 weeks LMP: 18 - 7,340 mIU/ml
6 weeks LMP: 1,080 - 56,500 mIU/ml
7 - 8 weeks LMP: 7, 650 - 229,000 mIU/ml
9 - 12 weeks LMP: 25,700 - 288,000 mIU/ml
13 - 16 weeks LMP: 13,300 - 254,000 mIU/ml
17 - 24 weeks LMP: 4,060 - 165,400 mIU/ml
25 - 40 weeks LMP: 3,640 - 117,000 mIU/ml
Non-pregnant females: <5.0>
- These numbers are just a guideline-- every woman’s level of hCG can rise differently. It is not necessarily the level that matters but rather the change in the level.
- In about 85% of normal pregnancies, the hCG level will double every 48 - 72 hours. As you get further along in pregnancy and the hCG level gets higher, the time it takes to double can increase to about every 96 hours.
- A single hCG reading is not enough information for most diagnoses. When there is a question regarding the health of the pregnancy, multiple testings of hCG done a couple of days apart give a more accurate assessment of the situation.
Q6. Refer to Vino's
Answer:
Upon the reasearch I have done, IgM type antibodies are stated as the most common type of cold agglutinin. However, there was this another antibody I came across named the Donath Landsteiner antibody. The Donath Landsteiner antibody is an IgG autoantibody that binds to red cells in the cold and fixes complement. Lysis occurs when cells are warmed to 37°C. Presence of the antibody is diagnostic for paroxysmal cold haemoglobinuria.
Specimen is collected into 2 plain tubes, one at 37°C and one at 4°C since cold agglutinins cause red blood cells to clump only at temperatures lower than 37 degree celsius. Supernatant serum examined for evidence of red cell lysis, comparing a tube incubated at 4°C then 37°C with a tube maintained at 37°C. No lysis in either tube indicates a negative result.
Q7. Refer to Royston's
Answer: Actually, as mentioned by my Lab personnel, controls not tallying is a rare occurrence as both the positive and negative controls are commercially prepared by manufacturers who have already run internal Qc for those controls before marketing them. However, in the event whereby the controls results do not tally with the previous day's, the controls will be run again. A different pair of positive and negative controls would be run this time. If despite that, the controls do not tally with the previous day's, the analyzer has to be calibrated again. Calibration refers to the process of determining the performance parameters of an artifact, instrument, or system by comparing it with measurement standards. Calibration assures that a device or system will produce results which meet or exceed some defined criteria with a specified degree of confidence. For example, my lab personnel from the microbiology lab mentioned that the photometer of the urine analyzer is blanked and restarted in the calibration process.
Hope Ive answered your questions. Feel free to clarify any more doubts of yours pertaining to my answers especially. Thank you once again for reading my posts! :)
Sasi
0503804g
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