Flow cytometry vs cytomorphology for the detection of hematologic malignancy in body cavity fluids

Flow cytometry and cytomorphology results on 92 body cavity fluids [61 effusions and 31 bronchoalveolar lavage fluids (BALF)] from hematologic malignancy were compared with retrospective clinical outcome. We observed double true positive/negative results in 67 cases (73%), and double false negative results in 2 cases (2%). Immunophenotyping accounted for true positive/negative results in 22 out of 23 mismatched cases (25%), and retained significantly higher accuracy than that of cytomorphology especially in effusions and differentiated lymphoma. In BALF analysis, immunophenotyping and cytomorphology sensitivity was 75% and 0%, respectively. Flow cytometry retains the highest accuracy in detecting neoplastic cells in body cavity fluids.