[Histonet] Re: Slide quality

[Joe Nocito]

have you seen some of the printed photomics lately in journals and even in 
some texts? I was flipping through a placenta pathology book and I couldn't 
count the number of wrinkles and folds in the umbilical cords and membrane 
rolls. And this was in PRINT!!!
    I recently left a place where the standards were set so high ( or they 
had me to complain to) that even though 97% of ALL material being produced 
was of excellent quality, everyone focused on the other 3%. I was told that 
I needed to strive for 100%. I told the medical director that if I had 97% 
through out college, I'd be a pathologist.
    With the shortage of techs, the time constraints that most of us are 
under and the pressure to do more with less, something has to give. 
Sometimes do do happens and then you step in it. There are a lot of 
unreasonable people out there. Do the best you can every time, know in your 
heart that you did your best for that day and get some sleep. I learned the 
hard way that you can't please all the people all the time.
    There is a country song from Aaron Tippin that has a line "what ever you 
do during the day, you'll have to sleep with at night" That's my philosophy 
now and I'm sticking to it.
    OK, I'm off my soap box now. Is it Friday yet?

JTT
----- Original Message ----- 
From: "Marshall Terry Dr, Consultant Histopathologist" 
<Terry.Marshall <@t> rothgen.nhs.uk>
To: "Robert Richmond" <RSRICHMOND <@t> aol.com>; 
<histonet <@t> lists.utsouthwestern.edu>
Sent: Wednesday, December 05, 2007 11:39 AM
Subject: RE: [Histonet] Re: Slide quality


Endorse those views wholeheartedly.
Wrinkles and scores don't spoil the slide for diagnosis - there's a
whole heap of other ways to do that.

Terry

-----Original Message-----
From: histonet-bounces <@t> lists.utsouthwestern.edu
[mailto:histonet-bounces <@t> lists.utsouthwestern.edu] On Behalf Of Robert
Richmond
Sent: 05 December 2007 17:23
To: histonet <@t> lists.utsouthwestern.edu
Subject: [Histonet] Re: Slide quality

You couldn't get the average pathologist, definitely including this one,
to even notice most of the folds and wrinkles that occur in sections.
We've become so used to ignoring them that when we teach
photomicrography to residents, we have to remind them not to photograph
areas in the slide with wrinkles in them - they look like hell when
they're projected.

I think that asking the pathologist to document wrinkles and folds is
unreasonable.

In the various labs I do pathology in, the recurrent problem is GI
biopsies with shatter and "window-blind" artifact. My requests to
address the problem are usually ignored. Very few pathology services do
separate processor runs for small specimens, and I've never been able to
get a laboratory to even consider it.

If I ran the zoo, I'd have a double headed microscope (not permitted for
pathologists in small pathology services), and I'd look at the day's run
of slides with a senior histotechnologist nearly every day.
That to my mind might launch an effective quality assurance program.

I agree with you (before you argue with me!) that most pathologists in
this circumstance would be so abusive that the exercise would be quite
unendurable for the technologist.

Bob Richmond
Samurai Pathologist
Knoxville TN

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