Modified Papanicolaou staining for oral swab samples stored long term

ABSTRACT

Pathologists collect swab samples for Papanicolaou (Pap) staining to diagnose various diseases including cancer and HIV. Time constraints and limited resources, may preclude staining a sample immediately. To re-confirm results, samples must be frozen for later analysis. We present a method for Pap staining cells that have been stored long term. An effective method for Pap staining of frozen cells should enable flexibility for processing samples.

KEYWORDS:

• Frozen samples
• long term storage oral swab
• Papanicolaou staining

Acknowledgment

We thank Michellie Thurman for editorial help.

Disclosure statement

Vijaya Raj Bhatt reports receiving consulting fees from Rigel, Agios, Incyte, Omeros, Takeda, Partnership for health analytic research, LLC (which in turn, receives funds from Jazz Pharmaceuticals) and Abbvie, research funding (institutional) from Abbvie, Pfizer, Incyte, Jazz, Tolero Pharmaceuticals, Inc, and National Marrow Donor Program, and drug support for a trial from Oncoceutics. The content is solely the responsibility of the authors and does not necessarily represent the official views of the NIH.

Additional information

Funding

This work was supported in part by the National Institute of General Medical Sciences [1 U54 GM115458], which funds the Great Plains IDeA-CTR Network, and the Fred and Pamela Buffett Cancer Center Support Grant from the National Cancer Institute [P30 CA036727]. Partial support came from NIH [P30MH062261] to SNB