Normal ranges for paediatric bronchoalveolar lavage cytology
Research type
Research Study
Full title
Normal ranges for paediatric bronchoalveolar lavage cytology
IRAS ID
148601
Contact name
Katharine C Pike
Contact email
Sponsor organisation
Southampton Centre for Biomedical Research
Research summary
The most common reason for children being taken to see their general practitioner or admitted to hospital is lung disease. Many different lung problems can cause similar symptoms such as cough or wheeze. Sometimes it is difficult to tell the difference between common problems, such as asthma, and rarer problems, such as being born with an abnormal part of the airway that is more narrow than normal. To tell the difference doctors needed accurate and reliable tests. Bronchoalveolar lavage (BAL) is a test used to look at cells and chemicals in the lower lung. In a BAL test clean salt water is sprayed into the airways of the lungs through a long bendable camera. The camera is also known as a flexible fibreoptic bronchoscope and through it the doctor can see the patient’s airway and take the sample from the most affected lung areas. The samples are then sucked out through the fibreoptic camera, stored and analysed.
The samples are taken to a laboratory, and the type and number of cells present are counted. Counting the numbers of different cells in BAL samples can help to understand problems in the lung. To do this the numbers of cells expected in healthy and those with lung diseases needs to be known. We can estimate the number of cells expected in healthy individuals by looking at the numbers of cells present in samples taken from either healthy volunteers or patients where the camera shows no airway problems. Results from many samples are needed to get a good idea of the range of normal values. We want to find out whether children of different ages have different values from adults we suspect they do because a child’s immune system is still developing. Child specific ranges will help us to interpret children’s’ BAL samples.REC name
London - City & East Research Ethics Committee
REC reference
14/LO/0413
Date of REC Opinion
4 Mar 2014
REC opinion
Favourable Opinion