Abstract

Awad A Eltyeb*, Sanhouri Kanan, Ahmed A. Gameel and Abbas A.A

ABSTRACT

Objective: To assess utility of the agarose cell block technique based on specimen adequacy and diagnostic accuracy. Material and Methods: 63 study subjects were selected for this study, among them 12(19%) were males and 51(81%) were females with age range between 4-77 years and the mean age was 36.97 ± 1.9. One cell block section and one smear were made from each case, the study cases were divided into 4 groups according to the type of specimens including thyroid 23 (36.5%), breast 15(23.8%), lymph nodes 6 (9.5%) and soft tissue masses 9 (14.28). The rest include three (4.76 %) effusions (Two Ascetic fluids and One pleural fluid), and 7(11.11%) urine samples. The soft tissue masses include face lipoma, post auricular, arm, back, right mandible, foot, ankle, neck, and abdominal masses. Result: When comparing the final diagnosis of cell block sections and cytological smears according to the background, cellularity, the nuclear and cytoplasm preservation, 21(33.3%) of samples were better by cell block technique, 27(42.9%) showed same results in both cellblock technique and smearing technique and 15(23.8%) were found to be less using cell block technique. Conclusion: The study concludes that different cellblock sections should be used for, histochemical, immunohistochemical (IHC), and Immunocytochemical (ICC) investigations in diagnostic cytology laboratories. Molecular studies such as, fluorescent /chromogenic in-situ hybridization (FISH/CISH) and in-situ PCR, could also be applied on cell block sections.