[Histonet] Re: Brain frozen sections

[Tim Wheelock]

Hi:

There is one thing you might try to make frozen brain sections more than 
acceptable.
You can freeze the tissue in liquid nitrogen vapor (LNV) (not directly 
into liquid nitrogen), let the tissue equilibrate to cryostat 
temperature, and then cut the sections.
The histology is almost as good as a paraffin section.

This is assuming that the technique fits the time frame within which you 
must arrive at a diagnosis.
Also we ourselves do not use frozen sections to screen brains 
diagnostically. We use paraffin sections from the formalin fixed half of 
the brain.
We send the LNV frozen blocks to investigators who cut sections from the 
frozen blocks for their research.

If you would like the details, you can contact one of the following 
individuals who do this routinely at our brain bank, to see if  this 
protocol is appropriate for your needs.



George Tejada
617-855-2646
gtejada <@t> mclean.org

Louis Fernandes
617-855-2636
lfernandes <@t> mclean.harvard.edu


Good luck.
I hope this information helps.



Tim Wheelock
Assistant Director, Neuropathology
Instructor In Neuroanatomy
Harvard Brain Tissue Resource Center
203 Mailman Research Center
McLean Hospital
Belmont MA 02478
Phone: 617-855-3592
Fax: 617-855-3199


Robert Richmond wrote:
> You guys tell your pathologists to listen to Dr. Hessler - he taught
> me how to do these preparations, and the basics of interpreting them,
> when I did a locum tenens for him at the Medical College of Georgia
> (in Augusta) 6 years ago. I did a lot of them when I got a full time
> job at a place that did a lot of neurosurgical pathology, a year
> later.
>
> Bob Richmond
> Samurai Pathologist
> Knoxville TN
> *********************
> There is nothing you can do to make brain frozen sections acceptable.
> Your Pathologists need to learn how to read smears, or just accept
> being wrong 50% of the time. An educated guess based on the imaging is
> more accurate than frozen sections on intra-axial primary brain
> tumors.
>
> Richard B Hessler, MD
> Chief of Pathology
> Erlanger Medical Center
> Chattanooga, TN
>
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