Unoriented skin ellipse grossing

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Unoriented skin ellipse specimen at cut-up. (WC/Mikael Häggström)

The article deals with small unoriented skin ellipse grossing.

Punch biopsies and oriented skin ellipses are dealt with separately.

Introduction

These specimens are very common.

Protocol

  • Name and patient identifiers on the requisition match the specimen container.
  • Specimen labelled as: "[ ]".
  • Specimen received in: [formalin/fresh].
  • Type: unoriented portion of skin measuring [ ] x [ ] cm (in the plane of surface), by [ ] cm (depth).
  • Inking: resection margin blue. †
  • Lesion: [ brown ] colour, [ diffuse / patchy] with a [ regular / irregular ] border.
  • Lesion dimensions: [ ] x [ ] cm (in the plane of surface), by [ ] cm (depth).
  • Margins: [ ] peripheral cm, [ ] deep cm.

Serially sectioned with cuts perpendicular to the long axis:

  • Block A1 - tips.
  • Block A2 - remainder of specimen.

Protocol notes

  • † One should avoid black ink if there is any suspicion of melanoma or if the lesion is pigmented. This can be remember by black is bad and green is good!
    • In general, green and blue are the preferred marking ink colours as they are easier to see at the time of embedding.[1]

Alternate approaches

See also

Related protocols

References

  1. Lester, Susan Carole (2010). Manual of Surgical Pathology (3rd ed.). Saunders. pp. 312. ISBN 978-0-323-06516-0.