[Histonet] IHC gunk

[Karen Heckford CA-San Francisco]

Good Morning,
I have recently developed a problem with contamination of some kind on my
IHC slides.
The contamination is black clumps and lays on top of the tissue.  I have
been told it is bacteria but the Pathologist and I kind of doubt that.   I
cannot get a good picture of it to show.  It may not be on all the slides
on the same run or even the same antibody slide.

I have decontaminated the whole system.  I have put fresh reagents on the
instrument.   This stuff looks like it would wash off at the end of the run
since it is sitting right on top of the tissue.  I do not see this stuff
elsewhere on the slide, only the tissue.   Does not matter if the tissue
was cut fresh or not.

I have tried everything I can think of to get rid of it and still have this
issue.  I use DiH20 from the hospital system.  Not sure if this may be the
problem.  I can have Engineering test the DiH20.

Any help would be greatly appreciated.

Thanks,

Karen Heckford HT ASCP CE

Lead Histology Technician

St. Mary's Medical Center

450 Stanyan St.

San Francisco, Ca. 94117

415-750-5751

karen.heckford@ <karen.heckford at dignityhealth.org>commonspirit.org




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