Bench Aids

The bench aids on this page are available in PDF format.  In order to access these files you must have Adobe Acrobat Reader.  If you do not have Acrobat Reader, please click here for more information.  If you experience problems downloading these files, email us at dpdx@cdc.gov.

Malaria
The following bench aids are a product of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.

• Preparation of blood smears (PDF file: 77 kb)
• Staining for malaria parasites (PDF file: 44 kb)
• Laboratory diagnosis of Plasmodium falciparum (PDF file: 127 kb)
• Laboratory diagnosis of Plasmodium vivax (PDF file: 166 kb)
• Laboratory diagnosis of Plasmodium ovale (PDF file: 165 kb)
• Laboratory diagnosis of Plasmodium malariae (PDF file: 149 kb)
• Calculating percent parasitemia and life cycle of Plasmodium species (PDF file:  80 kb)
• Comparison of the Plasmodium Species Which Cause Human Malaria (PDF file: 28 kb)
• Plasmodium spp. Blood Stage Parasites, Thick Blood Smears (PDF file: 938 kb)
• Plasmodium spp. Blood Stage Parasites, Thin Blood Smears (PDF file: 512 kb)

The following bench aid was developed for the Democratic Republic of Congo by the National Malaria Control Program of that country, with assistance from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention and United States Agency for International Development.

• Planches pour le Diagnostic microscopique du paludisme (PDF file: 885 kb)

Babesiosis
The following bench aid is a product of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.

• Laboratory diagnosis of Babesia spp. (PDF file: 195 kb)

Filariasis
The following Bench Aids for the diagnosis of filarial infections appear on this site courtesy of the World Health Organization.  The print quality of these PDF files do not show the finer details of the originals.  If you are interested in obtaining hard copies of these bench aids, please check the WHO's website for further details.

• Introduction and Characteristics of common human filarial parasites (PDF file: 435 kb)
• Plate 1 — Wuchereria bancrofti, Loa loa (PDF file: 352 kb)
• Plate 2 — Brugia malayi, Brugia timori (PDF file: 467 kb)
• Plate 3 — Mansonella perstans, Mansonella ozzardi (PDF file: 598 kb)
• Plate 4 — Techniques, artifacts, oddities (PDF file: 545 kb)
• Plate 5 — Onchocerca volvulus, Mansonella streptocerca PDF file: 490 kb)