Terminology Flashcards
Atresia
Absence or abnormal narrowing of a passage in the body; e.g. esophageal atresia when the esophagus has not canalized and does not lead all the way to the stomach
Heart Failure Cells
Macrophages that are dark colored because they’ve been eating hemoglobin in lungs, and processed it to hemosiderin (lungs having brownish color = induratio brunea pulmonis). Hemoglobin is there bc of RBC’s trapped with pulmonary congestion, probably from left-sided heart failure
Vegetations
Thrombi growing on heart valves
Emollition /
Emollition cyst
Emollition = Softening
Emollition cysts: pseudocystic lesions in liquefactive necrosis of brain. Not a real cyst because there is no epithelial covering, just necrotic tissue
Flowerbed impression
Depression on the surface of something that has been injured; occurs because healing scar tissue contracts.
Tiger Heart
Heart shows yellow/white stripes from fatty degeneration / fat accumulation
Fixed coronary
Long-term atherosclerotic occlusion of coronary arteries
Occlusion is >70%
Anthracosis
Carbon deposition in the lung’s macrophages, stays in lymph vessels and nodes. Results in black spots on lung.
Nutmeg liver
Degeneratio adiposa insularis hepatis / congestive hepatopathy. Brown speckled appearance of liver. Resistance in lung is increased, system backs up and have RV hypertrophy, then backs up even more through IVC and then liver. High pressure in liver decreases oxygenation.
The dark spots represent the dilated and congested hepatic venules and small hepatic veins. The paler areas are unaffected surrounding liver tissue.
Why would you use Prussian blue stain?
For hemosiderin deposits, as in the case of heart failure cells
Mallory bodies
Ubiquinated cytokeratin intermediate filaments in hepatocytes, seen in alcoholic liver disease. Appear eosinophilic
What stain is used for amyloidosis? How does it appear?
Congo stainining leads to red, but apple green birefringence with polarized microscopy
Kwashiokor
Fatty degeneration of liver due to high carbohydrate intake with little/no proteins.
Causes fatty degeneration of liver because apoproteins (ApoB100 in particular) are not produced and so TAG cannot be exported
von Gierke disease: what enzyme is missing
Glucose 6 Phosphatase Deficiency
McArdle disease: what enzyme is missing
muscle phosphorylase missing
Pompe disease: what enzyme is missing
Defect of lysosomal acid maltase - missing enzyme in lysosomes that causes glycogen to build up in them
Ephilis
freckles. not an increase in melanocytes, just an increase in melanin. not pathological
Pseudomelanosis
A dark greenish or blackish postmortem discoloration of the surface of the abdominal viscera, resulting from the action of sulfated hydrogen on the iron of disintegrated hemoglobin.
Lithiasis
stone formation (cholelithiasis or urolithiasis)
Barrett esophagus
gastroesophageal reflux leads esophagus to contain more columnar cells (normally squamous)
Increases cancer risk
Typhlitis
inflammation around cecum
Phlegmon
purulent inflammation of connective tissue
Psammoma body
spiral calcification - “concentric lamellated calcified structure” - that is suspicious for ovarian or papillary thyroid cancer. it’s a diagnostic feature.
Russel body
Plasma cell myeloma with excessive proteins trapped in plasma cell. not same as amyloidosis
What stain is used for tuberculosis?
Ziehl-Neelsen: tuberculosis is pinkish rods in otherwise blue lung
Anascara
Excess of fluid in the subcutaneous tissue
What is the difference between transudate and exudate?
Transudate: low-protein fluid (specific gravity <1.012). Occurs with volume or pressure overload or reduced plasma protein content
Exudate: protein-rich fluid (sp. gravity >1.012). Related to inflammation and increased vascular permeability
Pyle thrombosis (pronounced poo-leh)
Thrombosis in the portal circulation. May be due to liver cirrhosis
Hemascos
Bleeding in peritoneum
Dressler syndrome
pericarditis that’s post-myocardial infarction. autoimmune reaction due to antigens associated with necrosis from the MI
Lucidum intervallum
during epidural hematoma, the lucid period after going unconscious and before losing consciousness again
Mural Thrombosis
Thrombus originating from heart
Apoplexia
Cerebral hemorrhage / stroke from bleeding
most common use of it, but can mean bleeding into other organs too, such as apoplexia uteri
Charcott-Bucholdt Aneurysm
Aka microaneurysms. Aneurysms that occur in small blood vessels of the brain, mostly to basal ganglia. Associated with chronic hypertension.
Aschoff’s nodule
special granuloma in myocardium seen after rheumatic fever
Epitheloid cells
macrophages in granuloma packed tightly to look like epithelium
Zahn lines
Alternating red (RBCs) and white (platelets, fibrin) lines in thrombus. More typical of arterial thrombus
Scirrhous (an adjective)
scirrhous: describes a hard, slow-growing malignant tumor composed of fibrous tissue
Hamartoma
Non-neoplastic, disorganized, tumorlike overgrowth of cell types regularly found within an affected organ
Example: hemangioma - an irregular accumulation of blood vessels
Kernicterus
Bilirubin deposition causes yellowness in parenchyma
Buerger’s Disease
Necrosis in fingers due to hypersensitivity against materials of cigarette smoke -> proliferation of fibroblasts and thrombus formation inside small peripheral arteries together w/ inflammation of arterial wall (thrombangitis obliterans)
Oliguria
Production of small amount of urine
Curshman’s spiral
Mucous plugs found in asthmatic sputum
Charcot-Leyden crystals
Cystals found in asthmatics, formed from the breakdown of eosinophils. Proteins interacts with eosinophil lysophospholipases
Also may be seen in the stool or sputum of patients with parasitic diseases due to the eosinophil response
Xanthoma
Cholesterol deposit on tendon sheath. Seen with high serum cholesterol levels, like in familial hypercholesterolemia
Heterotopia / choristoma
Microscopically normal cells or tissues, but they’re present in abnormal locations. E.g. pancreatic tissue found in stomach or small intestines
Verruca
in endocarditis caused by rheumatic fever, get “verrucous endocarditis” with immune complexes, coagulated fibrin, and necrotic cell debris
Eisenmenger Syndrome
“point of no return” for left-to-right shunts. Have shunt reversal where it now goes right-to-left. Due to chronic pulmonary hypertension, pulmonary circuit endothelium thickens, resistance increases and blood flows backwards through the shunt. Baby then becomes cyanotic.
It’s irreversible, should do surgery before this happens
Anitschkow cells
In rheumatic fever, these appear in the “Aschoff Bodies” of the myocardium. They are plump activated macrophages. Have abundant cytoplasm and central nuclei with chromatin condensed to form a wavy ribbon (so they’re also called “caterpillar cells”)
