Automatic analysis to assess haematological parameters in farmed gilthead sea bream (Sparus aurataLinnaeus, 1758)

Abstract

The haematological parameters (RBC, Hb, PCV, WBC, TC, MCV, MCH, and MCHC) in farmed gilthead sea bream (Sparus aurata) were measured using an automatic method. We then compared the outcomes using the traditional manual method. After blood collection (T0), all samples were immediately analyzed using both the manual and automatic methods. The samples were successively divided into five different aliquots and stored at þ4 C to evaluate the effect of the storage time on haematological parameters, measured with the automatic method, at 6, 24, 48, 72, and 96 h after collection. Paired t-tests were applied between the values obtained at T0 with the manual and automatic methods and no statistical difference was observed. One-way repeated measures analysis of variance (ANOVA) showed that parameters measured with the automatic system were significantly affected by the storage time (p 5 0.0001). These results provide an innovative automatic method for the determination of haematological parameters in sea bream and suggest that the haematological profile can be accurately assessed within 6 h from blood collection.

Stability of haematological parameters in stored blood samples of rainbow trout Oncorhynchus mykiss (Walbaum, 1792)

“…These results, together with those reported in other species (Fazio et al 2012;Faggio et al 2013), confirm that long-term storage (166 h and above) influences the analysis of haematological parameters in fish. To avoid artefacts, samples should be assessed within 6 h after collection if stored at +4 °C (Faggio et al 2013).…”

“…Therefore, the decrease in Hb during storage is directly related to the significant changes in MCH and MCHC values. This is in contrast to what was previously observed in another species of fish (Fazio et al 2012), in which RBC did not show statistically significant changes and Hb values significantly increased during the storage time.…”

“…Only a few studies investigating the stability of haematological parameters in fish have been published to date (Fazio et al 2012;Faggio et al 2013). It is well known that the handling of blood samples, as well as the method of storage, can significantly influence the results of haematological determinations and consequently, these factors can result in blood samples yielding misleading results.…”

“…One of the major difficulties in assessing the health status of a natural population of fish is the lack of reliable references values from healthy specimens of a given species (Nicula et al 2010;Fazio et al 2012;Fazio et al 2015). Many authors have focused their studies on haematological parameters because they can provide important diagnostic information if standardised reference values are established (Huffman et al 1997;Clauss et al 2008;Buscaino et al 2010).…”

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“…One of the difficulties in assessing the state of health of farmed fish population has been the paucity of reliable references of the normal condition (Niculaet al, 2010;Fazio et al, 2012aFazio et al, , 2015a.…”