Laboratory productivity and the rate of manual peripheral blood smear review: a College of American Pathologists Q-Probes study of 95,141 complete blood count determinations performed in 263 institutions.

Context: Automated laboratory hematology analyzers are capable of performing differential counts on peripheral blood smears with greater precision and more accurate detection of distributional and morphologic abnormalities than those performed by manual examinations of blood smears. Manual determinations of blood morphology and leukocyte differential counts are time-consuming, expensive, and may not always be necessary. The frequency with which hematology laboratory workers perform manual screens despite the availability of labor-saving features of automated analyzers is unknown.