If you're new to the congo red stain for amyloid: You must have a positive control. Most of the controls I've seen recently have been medullary carcinomas of the thyroid, which usually (though not always) contain stainable amyloid.
I've asked many times on Histonet and never got a reply: amyloidosis is fairly easily produced in experimental animals. Why isn't this material used by pathologists as an amyloid control? Supposedly paraffin sections of control tissue must be cut within a month of use - the undeparaffinized sections deteriorate, though the paraffin block themselves do not. You must examine controls and patient sections using polarization. If you don't have a polarizer on your microscope - and most pathologists don't - then don't do the stain. The standard "jiss" - jiss use a pair of broken sunglasses - is not satisfactory. Anatech offers a stain they call "Amyloid Red" (it's clearly characterized in their promotional material) - has anyone used it? Bob Richmond Samurai Pathologist Maryville TN _______________________________________________ Histonet mailing list Histonet@lists.utsouthwestern.edu http://lists.utsouthwestern.edu/mailman/listinfo/histonet