• Casandra Jara, Carlos Veas, Carolina Delgado, Claudia Cabezas, and Mauricio Chandía.
• Unidad de Anatomía Patológica, Hospital Guillermo Grant Benavente, Concepción, Chile.
• Rev Med Chil. 2023 May 1; 151 (5): 560564560-564.

BackgroundThe alteration of cerebrospinal fluid (CSF) in hematologic neoplasms is a poor prognostic marker. The characteristics of CSF are usually analyzed by flow cytometry or cytology. However, paucicellular CSF samples (≤5 cells/dL) can sometimes be considered unsuitable for analysis due to the low number of events.ObjectiveTo evaluate the proportion of samples reported as suitable for analysis obtained by cytometry (FCM) and cytology in paucicellular CSF samples.Material And Methods169 samples ofpaucicellular CSF corresponding to 115 patients with hematologic neoplasms were selected. The samples were obtained by lumbar puncture in tubes conditioned with EDTA and Transfix®. We characterized the immunophenotype ofCSF samples with an 8-color panel, and 55 samples (32%) were in a small sample tube (SST). In all cases, monocytes were identified by CD14 labeling and T lymphocytes by CD3 labeling. The acquisition was carried out in a FACSCantoII® cytometer, and the analysis was performed using Infinicyt® software.ResultsThe proportion of samples suitable for analysis was higher in FCM compared to cytology (98% vs 61%, p < 0.000). We identified the presence of T lymphocytes and/or monocytes in most samples (98% and 90%, respectively). In the SST samples, the number of events recorded in low-volume samples (< 1 mL) was lower than in samples with higher volume (140 vs 556, p < 0.001), with a median of identification of 3 cell populations.ConclusionFCM allows the analysis of a higher proportion ofpaucicellular CSF samples than cytology in hematologic neoplasms study.

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