After the prognosis is carried out, the laboratory will carry out special tests on cancer cells and then send the results of these tests to the doctor who then will know what drugs are suitable to give to the patient. This process is known as carrying out the Treatment.
OUTLINE OF THE METHODS
Accurate Outline of the Hospital’s Lab Method
1. The patient will notice the lump which may be cancerous.
2. The patient will show the lump at the hospital where the surgeon will carry out a biopsy.
3. All or part of the lump, depending on the size, is sent to the lab.
4. They put the tumour in formalin.
5. They observe the appearance and texture of the breast tumour.
6. A piece of the tumour is put into wax.
7. The tissue in wax is cut into very tiny slices by a complex machine called the microtone.
8. One slice is taken and placed in xylene to remove the extra wax.
9. The water is removed by using alcohol.
10. The nucleus in the cells of tissue is dyed with Haematoxylin.
11. The rest of the cells are stained with a dye called Eosin.
12. Again, the piece is put into alcohol then into xylene.
13. This piece is placed onto a slide using another complex machine.
14. The same machine attaches a cover slip to the slide with special glue.
15. Finally the tissue contain the cells on the slide is observed under a highly powerful microscope, and then the slide is stored for future research.
Accurate Outline of the School Lab’s Cheek Cell Method
1. A cotton bud from a newly opened pack is taken.
2. The cotton bud is rubbed softly on the inside of the cheek and along the outer lower side of the gum to extract the cells.
3. The cotton bud is smeared over a small area of a clean microscope slide.
4. The used cotton bud is immediately placed in a small volume of disinfectant.
5. Three drops of 1% methylene blue (a blue dye) is used to stain the cells on the slide.
6. The smear is observed under a low magnification of a microscope. Then when the cells are in focus maximum magnification is used to observe the cells with the best resolution.
7. After observing, immerse the slide and cover slip in a beaker of disinfectant.
8. The cotton buds are disposed in a polythene bags by the lab technician according to the local regulations.
9. Slides and cover slips are washed thoroughly, dried and re-used.
COMPARING SIMILARITIES AND DIFFERENCES
Similarities
Both labs research on animal cells, which was from living tissues.
In both cheek cell experiment and breast cancer pathology, dyes are use to stain the cells so the parts of the cell such as the nucleus are marked out and then it can be viewed and observed more clearly under a microscope.
In both the experiments the cells are stained and prepared on to a slide and with a cover slip placed on top to be ready to observe under a microscope.
In both the laboratories we have seen the use of microscopes to observe the cells.
Differences
In the experiment carried out in our school lab we research or just observe our cheek cell but the hospital’s laboratory researches on cells from the breast tissue and with a reason which is to look for malignant cells.
The cells that we used are dead cells that are left at the outer layer of our skin. But the lab uses cells that are living, which are good for giving more accurate results. They are able to keep the cell of the breast tissue alive by keeping it frozen.
In our cheek cell experiment we have only used one dye to stain the cells which was the methylene blue. But in the hospital’s laboratory, they used more than two dyes to stain the cells. The main two that lab used was Haematoxylin and Eosin. They use these dyes to stain different parts of the cells. To be more precise, they used Haematoxylin dye to stain the nucleus blue and Eosin to stain the rest (cytoplasm) purple. This process makes the parts of the cells more clear to recognise unlike the die used in school which is less clear as we just used methylene blue which had an objective to colour the nucleus dark blue and the cytoplasm light blue. This obviously makes the parts of the cell harder to identify as the view is unclear. As different parts of the cell are stained different colours in the lab it also makes it easier to spot any changes or differences between a normal cells to conclude if the cells being observed are cancerous.
The microscopes found in their labs are much more powerful and bigger than the microscopes found in our lab which has a very low quality and so the single dye and less capable microscope in our lab give a very poor view of the cell that we view. As their microscopes contain higher magnification and a light to brighten up they view of the tissue, and also their lenses have scales to measure the size of what they see (cells). This is probably because they research on cells with more serious causes, dealing with cancerous materials, whereas we just have to research on dead cells. A more simple reason would be that their lab gets more funding that ours.
The labs at Guys Hospital use complex machinery such as the Microtone which is used to cut the tissue in wax into very thin slices, and this allows the scientists to get a better view of the whole area of the slice of tissue. A machine is used to prepare their slides, including placing a cover slip on top of the slides and joining them with special glue, this increases the accuracy for precise results and decreases the chances of contamination which could be caused by finger prints etc. if it was done by humans. These machines make their slides and results more accurate and fair, whereas in our lab we have to prepare a slide by our hand leaving finger prints and dust particle and because of these human errors the results for our cheek cell experiment was certainly contaminated and anomalous.
The cells that are researched in the lab are put in liquid nitrogen, by doing this the cells do not die, then the tissue is stored in wax, they cut this into slices and keeps one slice of the tissue in a tiny flat case for legal reasons, which is to keep a record of the patient because it may be needed in the future for things such as further treatment. In our lab we dispose the cells or wash it away as it is not part of a serious research.
- Disposing the Cells and other equipment:
After we finish the experiment we do not dispose the slides or any contaminated apparatuses but just wash it thoroughly removing all the cells and re-using the slides and the other equipment. In the lab it is considered very unsafe and unhygienic because used equipment will contain micro – organisms such bacteria and pathogens, therefore they keep the cells that they have researched stored, on the slides they used and store it as a record and dispose the apparatuses they used by incinerating or burning them, so all the germs are burned, killed and destroyed with all the used apparatuses, living no chance of contamination of the research.