[Histonet] hood for manual special stains

[Smith, Allen]

   I think a fume hood and a safety shower should be standard laboratory fixtures.
   I have a fume hood.  I use it for manual coverslipping.  I require my students to do the same.  OSHA says that exposure to xylene fumes can cause liver damage.  There is also a persistent rumor that repeated exposure to xylene fumes can cause Reynaud's disease.
   I handle formalin (37% formaldehyde) in the fume hood, and I would insist on having the hood if I handled full-strength formalin very often.
   I handle trifluoroacetic acid in the fume hood; I wouldn't use it at all without the hood.
   I wouldn't use ammonium sulfide without a fume hood.
   No one should ever handle osmium tetroxide outside of a fume hood.

Allen A. Smith, Ph.D.
Professor of Anatomy
Barry University School of Podiatric Medicine
Miami Shores, Florida

-----Original Message-----
From: histonet-bounces <@t> lists.utsouthwestern.edu [mailto:histonet-bounces <@t> lists.utsouthwestern.edu] On Behalf Of Mark Love
Sent: Wednesday, June 24, 2009 6:34 PM
To: histonet <@t> lists.utsouthwestern.edu
Subject: [Histonet] hood for manual special stains


The hospital where I work just opened a new lab. The histology department is now combined with cytology and is made up of me, a second histotech, a cytology prep tech, and our cytotech supervisor. We didn't have a hood in the old lab, so we did our manual special stains on a workbench with weak, overhanging vents that looked like lamps. The one hood in our new department completely belongs to the cytology prep tech. She has her centrifuge and a lot of other equipment in it, and my supervisor does not want me or the other histotech to share it. Some of our workbenches have small vents built into the walls, but when I do my specials there, I still smell chemicals. Do most histotechs today use hoods to do manual special stains or am I being too wishful?
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