Sharon

Welcome to a world of pain and suffering.

I have no idea what size a renal biopsy needle is but I would suspect it's
too narrow bore.  The secrets of successful needle biopsies are:-

As wide a bore of needle as you can convince them to use.

Two or three single, large, ORIENTABLE (orientatable?) pieces are better
than many small mixed up bits.

Get it to the lab without drying up.  Wrapping in "Clingfilm" helps.
Lots of practice at orientation.

Currently we pile the little pieces on a piece of hard paper and the freeze
as usual.  In the past we used orange sticks.  Others create little mountain
ranges with "OCT".

For orientation we use a stereomicroscope with a fibre optic light source.

Finally accept that this is difficult material.  You will not always get
perfect results.  It's less traumatic for the patient but a lot more
traumatic for the lab.

Andy Shand

-----Original Message-----
From: Sharon Allen [mailto:SAllen@exchange.hsc.mb.ca]
Sent: 27 May 2002 17:39
To: 'histonet@pathology.swmed.edu'
Subject: FW: Muscle needle bx's




> -----Original Message-----
> From:	Sharon Allen 
> Sent:	Monday, May 27, 2002 11:33 AM
> To:	histonet@pathology. swmed. edu (E-mail)
> Subject:	Muscle needle bx's
> 
> Hi,
> I would like information on doing needle bx's on muscles.  We are a
> Neuropathology Laboratory and have always done our muscle bx's using
> muscle clamps and freezing with isopentane/liquid nitrogen.  Because of
> the shortage of O.R. time caused by healthcare cutbacks (we have a 6 month
> waiting list), the neurologists are interested in doing needle bx's.  I
> have little to no information on freezing these specimens.  We are going
> to use the same needles used for renal bx's. I froze a couple of bx's
> using a piece of cork, a coverslip and OCT (have used this for primi
> babies muscle bx's), but this is very awkward. 
> I would appreciate any input into how to freeze these little guys, whether
> the bx's are taken down the muscle sheath or across, and the pro's and
> con's of this method.
> Thanks for any help you can give me.
> 
> Sharon Allen
> Neuropathology Lab
> Health Science Centre
> Winnipeg, Manitoba, Canada
> sallen@mb.sympatico.ca
>