Please read the clinical scenario, and then answer the question that follow to become familiar with the traditional NCLEX question format.
Halley is a 62-year-old female, previously healthy with no significant medical history, and no known allergies. She is admitted to your medical-surgical floor for an infectious disease work-up. Halley has been experiencing generalized pain and nausea for the past 3 weeks, and recently developed a fever. The doctors at the urgent care center, and then the emergency department, were perplexed by her presentation. You have been ordered to perform several tests: complete blood count (CBC), C-reactive protein (CRP), eosinophil sedimentation rate (ESR), blood culture, urine culture, and a lumbar puncture with cerebral spinal fluid (CSF) culture and cell count. You are also collecting a sputum culture, as well as swabbing her nose with a culturette, and performing a nasal wash.
-Halley's nasal wash results came back,and were reported as "insufficient cells available for testing." What does this mean?

Question

Please read the clinical scenario, and then answer the question that follow to become familiar with the traditional NCLEX question format.
  Halley is a 62-year-old female, previously healthy with no significant medical history, and no known allergies. She is admitted to your medical-surgical floor for an infectious disease work-up. Halley has been experiencing generalized pain and nausea for the past 3 weeks, and recently developed a fever. The doctors at the urgent care center, and then the emergency department, were perplexed by her presentation. You have been ordered to perform several tests: complete blood count (CBC), C-reactive protein (CRP), eosinophil sedimentation rate (ESR), blood culture, urine culture, and a lumbar puncture with cerebral spinal fluid (CSF) culture and cell count. You are also collecting a sputum culture, as well as swabbing her nose with a culturette, and performing a nasal wash. 
-Halley's nasal wash results came back,and were reported as "insufficient cells available for testing." What does this mean?

Quizplus · Accepted Answer

"Insufficient cells available for testing" means that the sample taken from Halley's nasal wash did not have enough cells to accurately perform the testing. This indicates that the sample was inadequate and that the nasal wash procedure must be repeated to obtain a sufficient sample. Therefore, the correct answer is D. A is incorrect since not enough cells cannot indicate that Halley is free of infection. B is also incorrect as sending a smaller sample would not provide more cells, and C is incorrect as insufficient cells cannot specifically point to a viral infection.

Please Read the Clinical Scenario, and Then Answer the Question