Abstract
Red blood cell (RBC) deformability in chronic alcoholism has been studied, using the Cell Transit Analyzer (CTA) which provides transit times of 5000 individual RBC passing via cylindrical micropores of 5.0 μm in diameter and 15 μm in length. Blood from chronic alcoholic patients without cirrhosis was studied before and after 8 days alcohol withdrawal. The results indicate: 1) the mean transit time of the RBC population from alcoholic patients is greater than those of the control population, 2) these changes affect the entire cell population and not only a sub-population, 3) alcohol withdrawal for 8 days improved the deformability of the most rigid cells of alcoholic patients (i.e., a slight but significant decrease of the highest percentile values of the transit time distribution).
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