Louri - A couple of suggestions:  Fix the whole placenta for 3 days in formalin prior to attempting to section if that is possible.  That will make it easier for your researcher to trim down her sections.  Of course that will depend on what type of testing you are going to perform, whether or not prolonged fixation will inhibit any of the protocols you will be performing.  Have the placenta sectioned into slices from the maternal surface down to the fetal surface in about 1" wide slices. She should then be able to take full thickness sections and hopefully that will make everything alright for you.  Our laboratory has housed the Placental Tissue Registry up until last year hear at MSU processing and sectioning about 2000 placentas a year.  Hope this helps.

  Louri Caldwell <louri_c@hotmail.com> wrote:

I'm sorry for the double post - I hit the "send" button too soon.

_____________

 

Hi Everyone,

 

I have a researcher who is working with placenta.  The problem: she wants to show all the layers, is cutting the tissue 5 mm thick and cramming it into a cassette, and is not satisfied with the results.  I have explained to her that it will be necessary to cut the tissue thinner before placing it into the cassette to achieve adequate processing, but she states this is too difficult. 

 

Does anyone have any suggestions as to an "easy" way to gross placenta into thinner sections?

 

Any assistance you may provide is greatly appreciated.

 

Thank you,

Louri Caldwell

---

Chat with friends online, try MSN Messenger: Click Here