The Normal Polynuclear Count in Man

Abstract

Ever since Cooke's polynuclear count became generally used in physiology and clinical medicine, the figures for the normal count in man, as given originally by Cooke and as republished by Cooke and Ponder 1 have been accepted as correct. These figures are as follows:

Cooke and Ponder's normal count is based on the average of the counts for 90 people of both sexes between the ages of 12 and 55, the greatest possible care being taken to exclude foci of infection. That their standard was exceedingly rigorous is indicated by the fact that these 90 “normals” took many years to collect.

But it has been suspected that the criterion of normality used by Cooke and Ponder was too rigorous, and that the counts of “normal” people, in the sense in which the term is generally used by physiologists and clinicians, are more left-handed than the above figures indicate. Kennedy 2 has reinvestigated the matter, using a less rigorous “health standard” more likely to be met by people “normal” in the ordinary sense. His conclusion, however, is that the figures given by Cooke and Ponder are substantially correct, and that an average polynuclear count with a mean of from 2.62 to 2.72 is met in a population of normal persons, whether normality is judged by Cooke and Pender's very rigorous criterion or by Kennedy's looser one.