Influence of cholesterol on shape parameters of erythrocytes in hyperglycemic subjects.

OBJECTIVE We determined the morphological changes of erythrocytes in blood samples of diabetic patients with varying levels of hyperglycemia with normo- and hyper-cholesterol concentrations and compared them with cells of healthy subjects. METHODS The shape analysis was carried out by shape descriptors based on projected area, perimeter and form factor, as measured by the processing of erythrocyte images. Blood smears were collected from normal subjects and from glycemic subjects with normo- and hyper-cholesterol levels. After image processing techniques like edge enhancement, thresholding, filtering, contour extraction, and pattern analysis and recognition, the images were used for shape analysis. RESULTS The shape parameters, which quantified the changes in erythrocytes in diabetic subjects with normal cholesterol level, showed significant deviation from the shape of normal cells. Cells of diabetic subjects with hyper-cholesterol level showed more deviation than cells with normal cholesterol. CONCLUSION These changes lead to hyper aggregation and to a decrease in deformability of erythrocytes and hence increase microcirculatory complications.