[Histonet] Documenting control tissue source?

[Morken, Tim]

Tom, I think it is a good practice, but not sure about regulations
besides privacy. It would be good to get away from the old way of using
anonomous tissue (that is, you can't trace it back to a specific patient
and disease). But it depends on what you need to document. There is
value in documenting the original source so you can trace back when you
need to understand the disease, fixation/processing or other results
that may be pertinent to your needs. It would be very helpful to know if
it was processed in your lab or a "foreign" lab that may have different
procedures. There may be some legal issues as well concerning patinet
permission to use the tissue, in which case documentation is essential. 

If you don't want to use the original number on all your paperwork (say,
for privacy or security issues) you can set up a master list that has
the original number and then key to a new "control tissue number" that
you use in daily work. 


Tim Morken
Technical Support Manager
Lab Vision Products
Anatomical Pathology
ThermoFisher Scientific

-----Original Message-----
From: histonet-bounces <@t> lists.utsouthwestern.edu
[mailto:histonet-bounces <@t> lists.utsouthwestern.edu] On Behalf Of Tom
McNemar
Sent: Friday, August 15, 2008 4:12 AM
To: histonet <@t> pathology.swmed.edu
Subject: [Histonet] Documenting control tissue source?

We are finishing up our JCAHO inspection today.  The inspector asked
about our control tissues and where we documented the source.  We get
nearly all of our controls from patient samples and she said that most
histo labs mark their control blocks with the source case number.  They
then keep records of the control source used when staining new cases.  I
can see no logical reason to keep this info.  You use a control
appropriate for the element being stained.  Why does it matter where the
control came from?  Am I wrong?  Do you do this?  

Thanks.

Tom McNemar, HT(ASCP)
Histology Co-ordinator
Licking Memorial Health Systems
(740) 348-4163
(740) 348-4166
tmcnemar <@t> lmhealth.org
www.LMHealth.org


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