What are monocytes?
Monocytes are a type of white blood cell (WBC) produced in the bone marrow and released into the blood when required. They play a key role in the body’s immune response. This test is included in Nordic Wellth’s Complete Blood Count (CBC) test.
Why test monocytes?
Monocytes are included in a detailed white blood cell test called a differential. This means that different types of white blood cells are examined to look for imbalances. This test is sometimes used when investigating allergies and asthma.
Health check
Discover risk factors for lifestyle diseases in time and do something about them.
Symptoms
A WBC differential is often part of a routine check when you have diverse symptoms.
Monitoring
Monitor changes to your blood values as you make lifestyle changes or undergo treatments.
What do the results mean?
What causes high monocyte levels?
Known as monocytosis. Some causes include chronic infection, heart infection, collagen vascular diseases, inflammatory bowel disease, intestinal parasites, and certain types of leukemia.
What causes low monocyte levels?
Known as monocytopenia. One low count is not usually medically significant. When tests repeatedly show low monocytes, this can indicate bone marrow damage/failure or a certain type of leukemia.
More information
Values that are slightly outside the reference range can be normal. Reference ranges are not perfect and approximately 5% of healthy individuals may have results outside the reference range.
Instructions
No advance preparation is needed for this test.
On the day of the test
Always take your ID with you when going for a test. Arrive early and sit down quietly for 15 minutes before the test is taken.