Hematology

Hematology, also spelled haematology, is the branch of biology (physiology), pathology, clinical laboratory, internal medicine, and pediatrics that is concerned with the study of blood, the blood-forming organs, and blood diseases. Hematology includes the study of etiology, diagnosis, treatment, prognosis, and prevention of blood diseases. The lab work that goes into the study of blood is performed by a medical technologist. Blood diseases affect the production of blood and its components, such as blood cells, hemoglobin, blood proteins, the mechanism of coagulation, etc. Physicians specialized in hematology are known as hematologists. Their routine work mainly includes the care and treatment of patients with hematological diseases, although some may also work at the haematology laboratory viewing blood films and bone marrow slides under the microscope, interpreting various haematological test results. In some institutions, haematologists also manage the haematology laboratory. Physicians who work in haematology laboratories, and most commonly manage them, are pathologists specialized in the diagnosis of haematological diseases, referred to as haematopathologists. Haematologists and haematopathologists generally work in conjunction to formulate a diagnosis and deliver the most appropriate therapy if needed. Haematology is a distinct subspecialty of internal medicine, separate from but overlapping with the subspecialty of medical oncology. Haematologists may specialise further or have special interests, for example in: treating bleeding disorders such as hemophilia and idiopathic thrombocytopenic purpura treating haematological malignacies such as lymphoma and leukemia (onco haematology) treating haemoglobinopathies in the science of blood transfusion and the work of a blood bank in bone marrow and stem cell transplantation only some blood disorders can be cured.

Common basic clinical hematology tests
In a clinical laboratory the hematology department performs numerous different tests on blood. The most commonly performed test is the complete blood count (CBC) also called full blood count (FBC), which Coagulation is a sub-speciality of hematology; basic general coagulation tests are the prothrombin time (PT) and partial thromboplastin time (PTT). Another common hematology test in the erythrocyte sedimentation rate (ESR).