Cytology!
This information might be useful for those of you in the Cytology elective! For a printable version, click here: cytology.pdf
Scan the slide at low power and assemble your description of the background. This should always include:
- Cellularity (low, moderate, high)
- Color (pink/purple)
- Texture (eg, stippling, homogenous, presence of granules, adjuvant material)
- RBCs (few, moderate, many)
And the following to your background description, if present:
- Protein crescents
- Lymphoglandular bodies
- Disrupted cells/debris
- Extracellular organisms
- Crystals (eg, hematoidin, cholesterol)
- Nuclear streaming (mild, moderate, severe)
For inflammatory processes describe:
- Nucleated cell differential (eg, many neutrophils (90%), few macrophages (10%))
- Features of each cell type present – eg, degeneration, vacuolation
- Intracellular organisms – rods, cocci, fungal hyphae (angles of branching, thickness), yeast (size, shape, color, broad or narrow based budding, capsule/wall), protozoa (size, shape, color, nuclear characteristics, wall features)
- Intracellular material – eg, adjuvant
- Extracellular organisms (can mention in your background)
For neoplastic processes describe:
- Cell types – round/discrete vs mesenchymal vs epithelial
- How cells are organized – solitary, aggregates, clusters
- Cell size, shape
- Nuclear size, nuclear shape (round, ovoid, oblong)
- Presence, number of nucleoli
- Chromatin pattern (fine, homogenous, ropey, dense, coarse)
- Cytoplasm: amount, color, texture, vacuolation, etc.
- Cytoplasmic borders (distinct, indistinct)
- N/C ratio (high, low, variable)
- Anisocytosis (minimal, moderate, marked, severe)
- Anisokaryosis (minimal, moderate, marked, severe)
- Pleomorphism of any type (nuclear, cytoplasmic)
- Mitotic figures (number of, normal vs bizarre)
- Matrix material, if present (sarcomas)
Miscellaneous things:
- Erythrophagocytosis
- Leukophagocytosis
- Mention normal cells that are present, eg osteoclasts, fibroblasts, etc.
- Mention inflammatory cells that are present in your neoplastic sample – eg eosinophils in your mast cell tumor or neutrophils in a sarcoma.
