[Helmer Ultra CW washing away cells]

I turned the decant speed down quite a bit and seem to be getting a decent result. At the end i have about 1 drop of saline in the tube Is this an acceptable amount? The decant is at 368rpm

[Helmer Ultra CW washing away cells]

Here is an attached image of after spin and after decant

[Helmer Ultra CW washing away cells]

You might check to see if the "global setting" for Spin Decant M is on or off. I think it needs to be off. To get to the global settings press the left arrow until they appear and then press the left arrow to toggle through all of the settings, when finished press Start Wash to save or exit.

Thanks, it was to on. It seems to be doing better right now. After the spin step i can see a button and it looks good to me. But still after the decant the button breaks apart and looks runny. I will try attaching an image in a bit.

[Helmer Ultra CW washing away cells]

My first thought when this happens is the tubes are overfilling. There is an adjustment on the tubing which you need to do as PM (check volumn dispensed). If move than allowable for the cell washer, the cells are filling up too much and during mix cycle more and more cells get decanted as they 'spill over'. This is the first thing I check and maybe you did, but I don't see it mentioned.

Yes i checked that, measured 56.4mL. This is the same value shown on display. I also measured the volume of the 12x75mm tube, it was around 4.5mL.

[Helmer Ultra CW washing away cells]

It sounds like when the cells are mixed up into the wash saline, they are being decanted out. Once cell button is produced in the bottom of the tube by centrifugation, it is pretty hard to dislodge all of it with the normal decanting process. It is much easier to lose all of the cells while they are suspended in the saline. Overfilling the tubes during the fill cycle can probably do this. I will have to look at our Helmer. I am more familiar with the decant mechanisms of our old Dade and Sorval cell washers. If the saline is really saline (and only saline) then that rules out water or bleach or anything else that might hemolyze the red cells. Has it all been the same cube of saline? Was it new when the problem started. Maybe it was manufactured with the wrong amount of salt? Test the specific gravity of the saline in the urinalysis dept and compare with what it should be (by calculation) or what a cube from another lot is.

Ive gone through a few different saline cubes, the lot numbers have been different. The tubes are 12x75mm and filled with 4.7ml saline

The wash(rpm) is set to 3500, Twash 0:35, decant(rpm) 425

[Helmer Ultra CW washing away cells]

Just a thought to rule out. Is the cell washer hooked up to saline or H2O? I know this is a "silly" question but I have seen it happen. The cells are not washing out they are hemolyzing. Just need to cover all possibilities.

I am using a SP Certified Blood Bank Saline cube from Cardinal Health

[Helmer Ultra CW washing away cells]

It is spinning, the rpms are all good. It seems to have a cell button but during the decant its gets lost. If i put the tubes in a centrifuge after a button forms

[Helmer Ultra CW washing away cells]

Forgive me if this has been covered already. I tried looking and did not see it anywhere.

I work in the biomed dept and got a work order for the cell washer washing away all the cells. We have a Helmer UltraCW. I have spoke with tech support and we have gone over all the settings and they are correct. But it still washes away the cells, they even sent me a loaner machine and with same settings i get the same results.

We are using Panocell 2-4% Reagent Red Blood Cells for testing. The way lab showed me to test is to put a drop in each of the 6 tubes, run the cycle and see if there is a cell button formed at the bottom. Everytime I do this I end up with nothing. But I have noticed if I press the check button after each step and look there is a button cell at the end of the 4cycles.

I am looking for how other labs use this device for testing. Maybe our method is wrong. The operator manual isnt much help except for setting the machine up.