Assistant Professor,Department of Pathology, Kasturba Medical College-Manipal, Manipal University, Manipal-576104, Karnataka, India. 3

Professor, Department of Pathology, Kasturba Medical College-Manipal, Manipal University, Manipal-576104, Karnataka, India

Senior Laboratory technician, Kasturba Hospital-Manipal, Karnataka, India.

Assistant Professor, Dept. of MLT, MSOAHS-Manipal, Karnataka, India.
Microcytes ,Platelets ,Hematology Analyzer ,

Red blood cell (RBC) or erythrocyte count and platelets are some of the most common requested investigation parameters in any hospital set up. The modern hematology analyzers use specialized technology to provide data. But a possibility of small erythrocyte fragments and microcytes being counted as platelets can lead to an erroneous platelet count. We report a case of a pediatric patient, diagnosed as thalassemia intermedia showing spuriously increased platelets on the analyzer. The manual smear review of the platelets did not tally with the machine count. But smear showed significant microcytes which were responsible for the discordant data. Thus, an awareness of such a technical phenomenon is important to avoid diagnostic errors.

4 , 2 , 2014