I haven't done muscle bx's in a while, but that was pretty much all I did at
Children's Hospital in Cincinnati up to 1991. And I believe probably not
much has changed. 
We did mainly needle muscle bx's. We sedated the patient before the
procedure and then used local anesthetic. The neurologist made a fairly
small incision, maybe 1 cm long, and then usually took one needle muscle bx.
The amount of tissue was adequate for frozens, formalin and glutaraldehyde.
The advantage I could see with open muscle bx's vs needle muscle bx's is the
size of the incision and using very little anesthetic with the needle bx. We
usually closed the incision with steristrips. Of course you were able to get
more tissue with the open muscle bx's. 

Beatrice DeBrosse BS, HT (ASCP)

> ----------
> From: 	Mitchell (Jean)[SMTP:jmitchell@neurology.wisc.edu]
> Sent: 	Monday, December 17, 2001 6:50 AM
> To: 	histonet@pathology.swmed.edu
> Subject: 	Needle Muscle Bx's
> 
> I am looking for some info/feedback from labs working with muscle 
> bx's.  More specifically comparing open muscle bx's to needle muscle 
> bx's.
> 
> For those working with needle bx's:
> Is this procedure done on both children & adults?
> Is it routinely done or only under certain circumstances?
> Do you receive adequate amounts of tissue? (for frozen & EM)
> Is one bx taken or multiple samples obtained from the same area?
> What size needle is most often employed?
> Is there a preference in open vs needle bx's or do you find better 
> results in one over the other?
> 
> Thanks much,
> 
> Jean Mitchell, BS, HT (ASCP)
> University of Wisconsin Hospital & Clinics
> Department of Neurology, Neuromuscular Laboratory
> Madison, WI
>