bluelantern

Holy hell this is exactly what the answer is. I completely forgot about these antibodies! You just earned me an extra 5% on my final exam. Pour yourself a drink!

So I know I said that I only had one question, but it looks like I have another one. The question on my assignment is as follows: A medical technologist became very confused at the result of a CBC she completed on a patient. As she went to pick up the tube off of the mixer, she noticed a large number of very small clumps in the tube. After she put the tube in a beaker of warm water (37o C), the clumps disappeared. She re-ran the CBC and the results looked more like the results of a patient who was actually alive. What could have caused this clumping? I'm really not sure what this clumping could be. I'm torn between 2 answers here. The first: the clumping is the result of platelets clotting. The second: This patient probably has multiple myeloma or hepatitis C. I believe this to be the answer I'm after due to the presence of cryoglobulins. These would "un-clump" if placed in the 37 degree water right? I'm not very familiar with a CBC test though and I could be off base. Any help is much appreciated and thanks in advance!!

I'm finishing up an assignment for my pathophysiology class and am stuck on this one question: Three patients are diagnosed with different types of cancer. One patient is a life-long smoker and has lung cancer, one has active Crohn disease and has colorectal cancer, and the other is a farmer with newly diagnosed melanoma. Other than the obvious thing, cancer, what do these individuals have in common? The only thing that I can think of is that all three of these cancers are the result of carcinomas. Am I over thinking this question? I have a hard time believing that something so simple could be the answer. Thanks for all your help!!!

So, I've just started my journey into the world of immunology and I'm already having trouble understanding a basic concept regarding complement proteins and their pathways. I understand the differences between the pathways, but for some reason cannot get something straight. When C4 levels are low, does this cause C3 to remain low through all the pathways? Also, If the complements are low, does this imply that the person will be more susceptible to bacterial and viral infections? Thanks in advance for any help.