Merits and pitfalls of normal saline rehydrated air-dried cervical smears over conventional wet.fixed PAP smears: A comparative study.

BACKGROUND: Cervical Papanicolaou (PAP) smear is the simplest, minimal invasive, and excellent screening method to reduce the female morbidity and mortality due to cervical carcinoma. Immediate alcohol fixation of the cervical smears is required to preserve nuclear details, delay in alcohol fixation leads to air drying artifacts. Rehydrating of the air-dried cervical pap smear with normal saline can help to overcome these artifacts and also have its own advantages. AIMS: This study was design to evaluate the effects, merits and pitfalls of normal saline Rehydrated Air-Dried Cervical PAP Smears (RADPS) compared with the Conventional Papanicolaou Smear (C-PAPS). SETTINGS AND DESIGN: Comparative study. METHODS AND MATERIAL: Prospectively paired cervical smears of 100 women, who presented to the outpatient department of gynecology of our institute, were prepared. Alcohol fixed smears were labelled as conventional Papanicolaou smear (C-PAPS) and air-dried smears labelled as rehydrated air-dried PAP smears (RADPS). Eight cytomorphological parameters were considered for comparison and analyzed. STATISTICAL ANALYSIS USED: Chisquare (χ2)/Fisher exact test. RESULTS: Clear background with red blood cells (RBC) lysis was noted in 93% of RADPS and 54% of C-PAPS. Cytolysis was observed more in C-PAPS (18%) than in RADPS (08%). Air-drying artifacts observed in 30% of C-PAPS and 08% of RADPS. Cytoplasmic staining (92% of RADPS and 85% of C-PAPS) was superior in RADPS. Cell border, nuclear chromatin, and border were also better appreciated on RADPS as compared to C-PAPS. Statistically significant difference was observed with 3 parameters, i.e., air-drying artifacts, RBC background, and distinct cell borders. CONCLUSION: Rehydration of air-dried smears can be adopted in regular practice, as an alternative or coupled with conventional wet fixation method to overcome the commonly faced problems of air-drying artifacts, especially in rural screening programs.

Trichoscopic Patterns in Squamous Cell Carcinoma: : A Case Report.

Squamous cell carcinoma (SCC) is the second most cutaneous malignancy after basal cell carcinoma (BCC) with increasing incidence. In the view its nodular manifestation; it can appear similar to nodular BCC, atypical fibroxanthoma, sclerosing liposarcoma and desmoplastic melanoma. Prognostic and therapeutic implications are different in all these conditions and thus their distinction becomes important. Trichoscopy is a simple and non-invasive technique to visualize certain morphological features of skin lesions and it improves the diagnostic accuracy for melanocytic and nonmelanocytic pigmented lesions. Here, a case is reported wherein trichoscopic patterns were useful in the diagnosis of SCC on the scalp. To the best of our knowledge, this is the first report on trichoscopic patterns in SCC from India.

Cutaneous angiomyolipoma.

We report a case of cutaneous angiomyolipoma (AML) found on the anterior abdominal wall of a 3-year-old female child. Histologic examination showed a well-circumscribed nodule in the dermis composed of an intimate mixture of convoluted thick-walled blood vessels, smooth muscle, and mature fat. This lesion differs from renal AML in terms of a lack of association with tuberous sclerosis, circumscription, absence of epithelioid cells, and male predominance. We concluded that the unique features of this lesion distinguish it from other lesions such as angiomyoma, angiolipoma, myolipoma, haemangioma, and other mixed mesenchymal tumors. This case report suggests that the features considered diagnostic of AML can occur in extrarenal sites and, therefore, this diagnosis cannot be excluded on the basis of site alone.