Department of Laboratory Medicine, Kangdong Sacred Heart Hospital, Seoul, Korea.
Optical Research Team, Magok R&D Campus, Z-tec Co., Ltd., Seoul, Korea.
Ann Lab Med. 2020 Jul;40(4):312-316. doi: 10.3343/alm.2020.40.4.312.
Angiogenesis is important for the proliferation and survival of multiple myeloma (MM) cells. Bone marrow (BM) microvessel density (MVD) is a useful marker of angiogenesis and an increase in MVD can be used as a marker of poor prognosis in MM patients. We developed an automated image analyzer to assess MVD from images of BM biopsies stained with anti-CD34 antibodies using two color models. MVD was calculated by merging images from the red and hue channels after eliminating non-microvessels. The analyzer results were compared with those obtained by two experienced hematopathologists in a blinded manner using the 84 BM samples of MM patients. Manual assessment of the MVD by two hematopathologists yielded mean±SD values of 19.4±11.8 and 20.0±11.8. The analyzer generated a mean±SD of 19.5±11.2. The intraclass correlation coefficient (ICC) and Bland-Altman plot of the MVD results demonstrated very good agreement between the automated image analyzer and both hematopathologists (ICC=0.893 [0.840-0.929] and ICC=0.906 [0.859-0.938]). This automated analyzer can provide time- and labor-saving benefits with more objective results in hematology laboratories.
血管生成对于多发性骨髓瘤（MM）细胞的增殖和存活很重要。骨髓（BM）微血管密度（MVD）是血管生成的有用标志物，MVD 的增加可用作 MM 患者预后不良的标志物。我们开发了一种自动图像分析器，使用双色模型从抗 CD34 抗体染色的 BM 活检图像中评估 MVD。通过消除非微血管后，将红色和色调通道的图像合并以计算 MVD。使用 84 例 MM 患者的 BM 样本以盲法方式将分析仪结果与两位经验丰富的血液病理学家的结果进行比较。两位血液病理学家手动评估 MVD 的平均值±SD 值分别为 19.4±11.8 和 20.0±11.8。分析仪生成的平均值±SD 值为 19.5±11.2。MVD 结果的组内相关系数（ICC）和 Bland-Altman 图表明，自动图像分析仪与两位血液病理学家之间具有非常好的一致性（ICC=0.893 [0.840-0.929] 和 ICC=0.906 [0.859-0.938]）。这种自动分析仪可以在血液学实验室提供节省时间和劳力的好处，并获得更客观的结果。
