title: Variations of broncho-alveolar lavage techniques affect cell recoveries.
abstract: Broncho-alveolar lavage (BAL) has become a routine method of sampling airway and alveolar milieu. Variations of BAL techniques, such as application of chest massage, may have an effect on cell yields. We compared numbers and composition of cells obtained by BAL with and without chest massage from naive rats and from rats infected 7 days earlier with 3,000 larvae of Nippostrongylus brasiliensis. Both techniques revealed significant increases in numbers of agranulocytes and granulocytes after N. brasiliensis infection, but the total yield of cells was 4-5 times greater when massage was used. The use of massage consistently increased the yield of macrophages, but did not result in consistently greater yields of lymphocytes or granulocytes.
authors: Department of Biological Sciences, University of Calgary, Alberta, Canada.
authors: W A
authors: WA
authors: Ferens
authors: M
authors: M
authors: Olson
mesh_terms: D000818:Animals; D001992:Bronchoalveolar Lavage Fluid / Q000166:cytology*; D002452:Cell Count; D004906:Erythrocyte Count; D005260:Female; D007958:Leukocyte Count; D008264:Macrophages; D008405:Massage; D009349:Nematode Infections / Q000473:pathology*; D009559:Nippostrongylus; D051381:Rats