Patsy, I have used this reprocessing schedule from Lee Luna's book "Histopathologic Methods and Color Atlas of Specials Stains and Tissue Artifact". This procedure has worked for me on a couple of occasions, You may need to change the times a little since your tissue samples are so small. Luna's book has a lot of information that is very helpful, and would be a good reference book to have in the lab. Hope this helps you out, give it a try.
Tissue Softening Solution The following solution is used for softening dried tissue specimens prior to reprocessing or processing Formol-Sodium Acetate (Stock) Solution Concentrated formalin (37%) solution 10 ml Sodium acetate 2 gm Tap water 90 ml Formol-Glycerol (Working) Solution Formalin-sodium acetate (stock) 90 ml Glycerol (glycerin) 10 ml Reprocessing Schedule Melt the paraffin blocks down Place the tissue in 3 changes of xylene for 1 hour each Place in 100% alcohol, 2 changes for 1 hour each Place in 95% alcohol, 2 changes for 1 hour each Place under running tap water for 20 minutes Place in formol-glycerol working solution until tissue becomes soft (In most instances this will occur within 5-8 hours: extended exposure to the formol-gycerol will not harm tissue specimens) Place the tissue in the process and proceed with routine Processing schedule. How ever it is not necessary for the tissue to go through the fixative stations on the processor Best of Luck, Shelly Shelly Christenson HT (ASCP) Veterinary Diagnostic Laboratory Histopathology L-216 Mosier Hall Kansas State University 785/532-4464 ________________________________________ From: histonet-boun...@lists.utsouthwestern.edu [histonet-boun...@lists.utsouthwestern.edu] on behalf of Patsy Ruegg [pru...@ihctech.net] Sent: Tuesday, November 15, 2011 2:26 PM To: 'histo net' Subject: [Histonet] is there a way to recover ruined tissues My tissue processor was loaded and although the technician thought they started it, the next morning the tissues were found dry in the retort with the processor not started. Another technician just started the machine so the tissues got processed as they would have been had it started the day before. The tissues look terrible, they shrank so much that the pieces started coming out of the cassettes even though they were plenty large enough in the first place. The tissues were found to be very small and hard but were embedded, sectioned and stained anyway (I was not informed about this until I started questioning why the tissues looked so bad). Of course the investigator is very upset that their tissues are ruined. Does anyone know if there is any way to try and recovery these tissues? They were mouse lungs and livers. The livers are not as bad as the lungs, the lungs were inflated and they look compressed and unrecognizable as lung tissue. If the investigator will ever speak to me again I am going to ask for the blocks back and try melting them down and perhaps try to rehydrate them somehow for reprocessing. Regards, Patsy Patsy Ruegg, HT(ASCP)QIHC IHCtech 12635 Montview Blvd. Ste.215 Aurora, CO 80045 720-859-4060 fax 720-859-4110 www.ihctech.net www.ihcrg.org _______________________________________________ Histonet mailing list Histonet@lists.utsouthwestern.edu http://lists.utsouthwestern.edu/mailman/listinfo/histonet _______________________________________________ Histonet mailing list Histonet@lists.utsouthwestern.edu http://lists.utsouthwestern.edu/mailman/listinfo/histonet