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Comparison of the effectiveness of two liquid‐based Papanicolaou systems in the handling of adverse limiting factors, such as excessive blood
Author(s) -
Sweeney Brenda J.,
Haq Zafarul,
Happel James F.,
Weinstein Barbara,
Schneider Douglas
Publication year - 2005
Publication title -
cancer cytopathology
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 3.052
H-Index - 304
eISSN - 1097-0142
pISSN - 0008-543X
DOI - 10.1002/cncr.21425
Subject(s) - vial , medicine , papanicolaou stain , liquid based cytology , limiting , papanicolaou test , cytology , filtration (mathematics) , cervical cancer , gynecology , urology , cancer , chromatography , pathology , chemistry , mechanical engineering , engineering , statistics , mathematics
BACKGROUND Excessive blood may compromise gynecologic Papanicolaou (Pap) smears. Liquid‐based cytologic techniques have been developed in part to address this problem. In the current study, conditions of excessive blood were simulated to compare the ability of two liquid‐based systems, ThinPrep® and SurePath™, to satisfactorily process specimens in the presence of this potentially limiting factor. METHODS Equal volumes of washed epithelial cells derived from pooled residues of liquid Pap vials were added to a series of ThinPrep and SurePath vials. Increasing volumes of freshly drawn, packed erythrocytes were added to the vials in progressive amounts from 50 μL or 100 μL up to 3000 μL. The vials were processed on their respective instruments according to U.S. Food and Drug Administration‐approved procedures for a total of six test runs. The cellularity of the slides was measured by averaging epithelial cell counts in a total of five 40× fields. RESULTS SurePath preparations were uncompromised by blood until aliquots from 1000 μL to 3000 μL were reached. The ThinPrep system invariably was overwhelmed by the first 50‐μL or 100‐μL aliquot of blood, with epithelial cell counts dropping immediately to near zero. CONCLUSIONS The cell enrichment process of the SurePath system capably handled significantly greater amounts of potentially obscuring blood than the membrane filtration method of the ThinPrep system, which was compromised by as little as ≤ 1 drop of packed erythrocytes (1 drop = 65 μL). Cancer (Cancer Cytopathol) 2006. © 2005 American Cancer Society.