AbstractsBiology & Animal Science

Design of a biopsy supporting container for a new snap freezing procedure:

by B.H.J. Hegeman




Institution: Delft University of Technology
Department:
Year: 2015
Keywords: medical; biopsy; cryogenic; snap freeze; tissue
Record ID: 1272301
Full text PDF: http://resolver.tudelft.nl/uuid:a2d9edc5-de7e-44f1-b30f-3137fd3452db


Abstract

This report gives an overview of the followed process, findings and results of the graduation project: Design of biopsy supporting container for a new snap freezing procedure. The project is a collaboration between the IDE faculty of TU Delft and the company PamGene. Carried out by an IPD master student with a Medisign specialization. Literature research The starting point of the assignment concerns the exploration of biopsy acquisition, processing and sectioning for diagnosis. Through the literature study it became apparent that biopsy specimens are taken for a variety of reasons but one of the main reasons to collect a biopsy specimen is to check for cancer and if so if the tissue is benign or malignant. From the study done it was noticed that there is a variety in medical equipment to collect a biopsy specimen, ranging from specialized needles up to the regular scalpel. Next to that there are different ways to obtain and process tissue, which may differ from hospital to hospital. During the literature research special focus was given to the core biopsy needles. This type of instrument is commonly used for almost the whole body to obtain a biopsy specimen. Core biopsy needles are considered minimal invasive instruments, which mean that the damage done to the patient’s body is kept a low a possible. Minimal invasive procedures have several advantages over regular surgical procedures due to the shortened hospital stay, accelerated rehabilitation, small incision, less blood loss and a reduction in scar tissue. Depending on the type of diagnosis, tissue is fixated with formalin or transported fresh to the pathology laboratory. At the pathology laboratory, most of the tissue is processed further by embedding it in paraffin and a smaller amount is fresh frozen. From the literature it became apparent that multiple medical professionals with different backgrounds and functions work together to get the tissue specimens out of the body up to the diagnosis of the tissue. However there is little information available regarding the exact actions that are performed by medical specialists. The same applies to information on the best freezing methods and temperatures for different types of tissues. Field research Next to the literature study a field research has been performed to observe the currently used workflows and to indicate tasks of the different medical professionals. Furthermore other aspects like the instrument and biopsy handling, communication between departments and of course problems experienced by the medical professionals themselves where not found yet. Therefore it was important to observe several biopsy acquisition and processing procedures. The ErasmusMC hospital in Rotterdam was used as a starting point for the field research. ErasmusMC was used as a starting point because it is one of the eight UMC’s in the Netherlands, which means it is one of the more specialized hospitals. From thereon two different regular hospitals were visited to get a better general picture of the complete workflow. A…