Red Cell Centre - Protein Laboratory

Red Cell Centre Overview

The King’s College Hospital based Red Cell Centre (RCC) is a national references centre for clinical and laboratory services for patients with a range of red cell disorders, providing a comprehensive and integrated approach to the diagnosis, management and treatment of a variety of disorders .

The Centre looks after a large number of patients with Sickle Cell disease.  Care pathways have been established for both paediatric and adult patients.  This includes specialist wards for inpatient management and day wards for transfusion and assessment of both adults and children with red cell abnormalities. 

Viapath Analytics form the core laboratory component of the RCC and comprise of a designated national centre for neonatal screening of sickle cell diseases, antenatal screening and diagnosis and prenatal molecular diagnosis of haemoglobinopathies. The laboratories are divided into two, one focusing on phenotype and screening the other definitive molecular diagnosis. The two laboratories work closely together to offer a comprehensive service aiming to achieve a diagnosis for cases of unexplained anaemia. 

Red Cell Centre – Protein Laboratory at King's College Hospital

Our laboratory serves the local population and is also a national referral centre that provides a comprehensive service for the analysis of haemoglobin variants and thalassaemias and red cell enzymopathies.

We offer a comprehensive range of assays for the measurement of red cell enzymes and other investigations of red cell haemolysis. We provide this service for a wide range of referrers throughout the UK and beyond.

Key features

Analytical procedures performed include universal Antenatal Screening and Neonatal Screening as part of the Regional New Born Screening Program, processing approximately 60,000 samples annually. Initial screening is by HPLC and further tests are performed depending on the HPLC results, red cell indices and clinical details. This could include sickle solubility testing, electrophoresis, including isoelectric focussing and HbH bodies. 

All samples sent for analysis receive an interpretive comment relevant to the clinical details. Our close links to the Molecular Haemoglobinopathy Laboratory mean we can offer a full haemoglobin variant and thalassaemia identification service.