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Abstract

An apparatus and method for analyzing the cell objects of a cell sample for the diagnosis and treatment of actual or suspected cancer is disclosed. An image of the cell sample is first digitized and morphological attributes, including area and DNA mass of the cell objects are automatically measured from the digitized image. The measured attributes are compared to ranges of attribute values which are preestablished to select particular cell objects having value in cancer analysis. After the selection of cell objects, the image is displayed to an operator and indicia of selection is displayed with each selected cell object. The operator then reviews the automatically selected cell objects, with the benefit of the measured cell object attribute values and accepts or changes the automatic selection of cell objects. In a preferred embodiment, each selected cell object is assigned to one of six classes and the indicia of selection consists of indicia of the class into which the associated cell object has been placed. The measured DNA mass of identified cell object fragments in tissue section samples may also be increased to represent the DNA mass of the whole cell object from which the fragment was sectioned.