Matt88s
13th September 2007, 02:18 PM
Today in lab we viewed live blood cells. I've viewed a lot of tissues and cells before but this was the first time we used fresh blood. How did we get the fresh blood? Here's how, "All right class, use your lancet to obtain your blood sample, no, not on your partner, yourself".
I somehow, probably due to living in a vacuum, managed to reach adulthood without being aware of exactly what a lancet was and how to use it. All I knew was that it was a neat little device we were to use to make ourselves bleed. I assumed it was like a little scalpel, and was trying to cut though all my super tough skin using it like a scalpel, cussing at how dull the thing was and about to go get a razor blade out of my car, when a helpful classmate pointed out you weren't supposed to cut, you were supposed to stab yourself with it. I said, stab?
I'm not opposed to cutting myself but even I shy away from outright stabbing. I finished the job, using it as the dullest scalpel I've ever used, and prepared my slides.
Basically we had our normal saline, our hypertonic, and hypotonic solution.
Anyhow, the point of this whole post was how my red blood cells looked. They had little spinynibbydots all over them. I looked in and said, eek. :o I had the instructor look at them as well and he dismissed it and said the slide was probably contaminated with something. I was pretty careful preparing the slide though, and they were pretty uniformly odd looking. I suppose the saline solution we used to prepare the slide might have been contaminated with something, but why would it stick to the red blood cells? I also had quite a few white blood cells. Granted I've been feeling a bit down lately, and I might well just be fighting off a cold, but its kind of odd.
It wasn't sickle cell disease or anything.
On one hand I'm like, meh, it probably was just contaminated. On the other hand I'm like, that looked really strange, and if there is something wrong I really should find out (read before I die).
Maybe I'll see if I can take another sample and check it out. Yippie, I get to cut myself again. :C
I somehow, probably due to living in a vacuum, managed to reach adulthood without being aware of exactly what a lancet was and how to use it. All I knew was that it was a neat little device we were to use to make ourselves bleed. I assumed it was like a little scalpel, and was trying to cut though all my super tough skin using it like a scalpel, cussing at how dull the thing was and about to go get a razor blade out of my car, when a helpful classmate pointed out you weren't supposed to cut, you were supposed to stab yourself with it. I said, stab?
I'm not opposed to cutting myself but even I shy away from outright stabbing. I finished the job, using it as the dullest scalpel I've ever used, and prepared my slides.
Basically we had our normal saline, our hypertonic, and hypotonic solution.
Anyhow, the point of this whole post was how my red blood cells looked. They had little spinynibbydots all over them. I looked in and said, eek. :o I had the instructor look at them as well and he dismissed it and said the slide was probably contaminated with something. I was pretty careful preparing the slide though, and they were pretty uniformly odd looking. I suppose the saline solution we used to prepare the slide might have been contaminated with something, but why would it stick to the red blood cells? I also had quite a few white blood cells. Granted I've been feeling a bit down lately, and I might well just be fighting off a cold, but its kind of odd.
It wasn't sickle cell disease or anything.
On one hand I'm like, meh, it probably was just contaminated. On the other hand I'm like, that looked really strange, and if there is something wrong I really should find out (read before I die).
Maybe I'll see if I can take another sample and check it out. Yippie, I get to cut myself again. :C