6. Histological Interpretation

Question 1

What do you need to identify when looking at a slide?

Answer 1

What tissue?
Normal or abnormal?
If abnormal why? Inflammation or neoplastic
If neoplastic, benign or malignant?
If malignant, primary or secondary?

Question 2

Compare benign vs malignant

Answer 2

Benign: localised, no invasion, no metastases, slow growth, good differentiation, normal nuclear chromatin, uniform cell size

Malignant: spread, invasion, metastases, rapid growth, poor differentiation, increased nuclear chromatin, pleomorphism

Question 3

How do you tell between primary and secondary malignant?

Answer 3

Use immunohistochemistry

Question 4

What does H & E stain?

Answer 4

Haematoxylin (purple): nuclei

Eosin (pink): cytoplasm

Question 5

What is the difference between histology and cytology?

Answer 5

Histology is study of biopsies and specimens

Cytology is the study of cells