Marg,
Usually ,  70% alcohol  will continue to fix the specimen and also will
wash out
much of the salt from the formalin.

Do your tissues appear to be mooshy after processing?

If not,  The problem may the the paraffin baths on the processor are
cooking the
tissue.  I would recommend using a low melting point paraffin on the processor.
Check the temperatures of the baths with a thermometer.

How long are you keeping the biopsies in the paraffin baths?  How many paraffin
baths are on the processor?

Rande Kline, HT (ASCP)
Technical Services
EM Science




"Colbert, Laurie" <LColbert@phsca.org> on 04/27/2000 05:34:42 PM

To:   "'Hagerty, Marjorie A.'" <mhagerty@emc.org>, "'Histonet'"
      <Histonet@pathology.swmed.edu>
cc:    (bcc: Rande Kline/EMI/Merck)
Subject:  RE: Help Needed



Marg,

In our quest to solve our processing problem I was told that alcoholic
fixation would give a more intense hematoxylin stain - that the chromatin
would look denser and darker.  Are you starting your processing run with
formalin or alcohol?  Just a thought - good luck!

Laurie Colbert
Saint Joseph Medical Center
Burbank, CA

-----Original Message-----
From: Hagerty, Marjorie A. [mailto:mhagerty@emc.org]
Sent: Thursday, April 27, 2000 1:06 PM
To: 'Histonet'
Subject: Help Needed


Hi,

I have a problem which I have never encountered before. The tissue coming
off our rush machine, mostly small biopsies and bone marrow blocks, is not
right. The nuclei are muddy and the epithelium a little blown out. They are
extremely basophilic picking up the hematoxylin very intensely.

Any one have any experience with this? All temperatures check out. The
problem seems to be the during the processing.

We plan to change every solution on the machine, but I sure would like to
know what causes this. Any ideas/help would be greatly appreciated.

Thanks!
Perplexed in Palm Springs
Marg