[Histonet] FW: Leica Bond Max artifact

[Linda Margraf]

Here is a message I am posting for Dr. Rosen:
Hello,

I am a longtime admirer of this list, and I am sure someone on here can help us out

We have an artifact on our immunohistochemistry (IHC) slides.

I will attempt to attach pictures using the upload tool. In case that doesn’t work, I am attaching a google drive link to some jpgs. The artifact is usually golden brown to red/pink in color, is clustered, appears both on top of the tissue and around it. If we do an aggressive rundown, it appears less red/brown and bluer.

We are using a Leica Bond MAX IHC system which is about a year old. We usually do two runs a day and 95% of the time we only use a red detection kit. We only see this on our red detection kit on our Leica bond. The brown is unaffected. The corresponding H&E slides are fine.
We started having this artifact after a month or two of production. 85% of the time we have some sort of artifact. Sometimes its perfect, sometimes it makes the tissue unreadable. We haven’t figured out any precipitating factors.

We have tried a number of things, but we still can’t get control of this.
Here is a brief overview of our protocols:
- Processor: Leica ASP300s tissue processor.
-Parrafin = Mercedes HWWX (dual purpose embedding and infiltration parrafin) melting point 57c – we tried switching, and it didn’t help.
- We only use distilled water in our baths
- Mercedes Starfrost charged slides
- Oven for 30 min at 62c
- We always use a cold red detection kit
-Sometimes our runs are delayed but not more than 4 hours
- Rundown is done in our stainer (standardized), and slides are coverslipped with tape.
- The bulk fluid containers in the bond are cleaned weekly and refrigerated between runs.
- The probe is cleaned every 300 slides.
- Mixing wells are cleaned out every two weeks and replaced often.
-Covertiles are well tended to.

We have tried to correct this problem, but we can't seem to fix it.
Any ideas?

https://drive.google.com/open?id=1wUttTweP7SYLRM5pkGOBr0MBzCMrtJSA<https://urldefense.proofpoint.com/v2/url?u=https-3A__drive.google.com_open-3Fid-3D1wUttTweP7SYLRM5pkGOBr0MBzCMrtJSA&d=DwMFaQ&c=fHUKEfYp8ZKZp-Z4zyr9bXWWb-JCctOum5ZlzbjkVjM&r=1o7iZWfSCXEgDesmDMuV2rPUZJJnqv0nrvyFk2x0v0A&m=i7Ca5SrRojLnKG1c5k_oFTuocpFcJZ4BUGjdsiw477Q&s=v-vNoy8KgrPg0AxG3-Oxmp7s0DKlExpBrpdNhGkUWQ8&e=>


Jason R. Rosen, D.O.
Dermatopathologist
Premier Dermatology Partners
4675 Linton Boulevard, Suite 203
Delray Beach, FL 33445
(p) 561-499-5341
(f) 561-499-5343
(e) JRosen at totalderms.com<mailto:JRosen at totalderms.com>