Establishment of harmonization in immunophenotyping: A comparative study of a standardized one-tube lymphocyte-screening panel.

BACKGROUND: Multiparameter flow cytometry has been increasingly used in the identification and characterization of leukemia and lymphoma. However, due to technical complexity, this method still presents some level of variation between laboratories. In an attempt to yield more reproducible results, restrictive, highly standardized procedures have been proposed. The objective of this work was to compare this standardized protocol to a more open and flexible procedure.
METHODS: The levels of expression of markers from the Euroflow lymphoid screening tube (LST) panel were evaluated on a population of both healthy and diseased patients using the recommended monoclonal antibody (MoAb) combinations or an alternative combination of either different MoAb clones or different dyes. Results were expressed as the percentages of positive target cells for each marker.
RESULTS: Our study shows excellent correlation between the two methods demonstrating that comparable results can be achieved through harmonization of the procedures rather than through the constraints of standardization.
CONCLUSION: Our results demonstrate that the harmonization approach is feasible. This frees scientists from the restrictions imposed by a standardization approach.