"To study the phenomenon of the disease without books is to sail an uncharted sea, while to study the books without patient is not to go to sea at all" - Sir William Osler
- I chose to start with these lines because pathology nowadays is evolving with the recent technologies and due to this many pathologists are reporting the slides digitally by telepathology.
- For this reason, many of us don't want to examine the patient or do the procedure personally. But to be very frank, although most of the diagnoses of breast cytology can be quickly delivered just by looking at the slides the grey areas still exist.
- To understand the cytology of any organ it’s very important that a pathologist should be part of procedure rather than just looking the slides and delivering the diagnosis.
- Being a part of procedure makes you come across the clinical aspects of the disease which helps in giving a more confident diagnosis.
- Practically when you are not practicing in a higher center or a metro, people expect more fromyou in cytology and at that moment if you are delivering a confident correct diagnosis you will be on the better side of a coin.
- To be a good cytopathologist you should be well versed with the cellular details of particular organ with basic morphology.
- Performing FNA is an art. Some people think that it’s just to insert a needle and poke it in particular lesion which gives you material for the diagnosis. For me it’s a big NO.
- For performing a perfect FNA you should have a complete knowledge of adjacent organs and the possible differentials on that particular site. I have seen people poking the needle in cervical rib because of misinterpreting it as a hard calcified node.
- While performing an FNA the very first thing is to make the patient comfortable so that he/she can cooperate you with the procedure.
- There is no substitute for proper history taking. When we talk of breast lesions people usually miss the history of trauma which can be sometimes very important in arriving at the diagnosis of difficult lesions like fat necrosis.
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