Out of the Ashes

Most posts on this blog have not been forthcoming and I apologise for that. The reason has been the merging of two labs and the issues involved. To combine two departments is never easy. It would be like asking France and Germany to become one country, both have their own way of doing things and neither particularly like the idea of changing. The easiest way to merge is for both departments to start again with a neutral location. I work in the NHS, finding a neutral location that a trust is willing to spend money on is near enough impossible. So we do our best. The moving of everyone to one site is problematic, just the movement of hardware alone can be tricky but in July the move occurred. Then the fun begins.

For those we don't know, the summer is the busiest time for the labs in Britain. Everyone is having time off for their holidays. In the past the summer used to be quiet, surgeons would go on holiday, theatres would lie unused and the time would be taken to give it a really good spring clean and possibly a lick of paint. The theatres are always in use now. If a surgeon goes on holiday then their slot is given to someone else. The histology lab still continues to receive the same amount of specimens but it has less staff to deal with them. When I was young and starting out I often went a whole summer without a break until one year I had to go to the USA in August for a cousin's wedding. It was the first summer where I wasn't exhausted by the time I got to September. Never again will I ever work a summer without a break in July or August.

 So we are stretched with staff, some of whom are new to the building and don't know where anything is and trying to provide the same service as before. How this all effects me is that I'm charged with merging the two different SOPs for the staining methods from both labs. Methods that are the same and yet subtly different. For the last two years since the official merger of the two departments I have made sure that one document has covered both sites and contained detail on both methods, that was easy. So there was a stainer on each site each with a set of the same SOPs but one stainer would follow the black instructions, the other the blue. Now it has to be one set of SOPs with only one colour ink.How do you decide with way to go? Which method do you chose?

For me, I pick neither. I pick the best method. I pick the method which produces the best results. Perform both methods on the same tissue and see what happens. The perfectionist that I am would never allow it to be that simple. The method has to be researched, looking through papers and books to indicate what the various changes mean and why they might work better. In doing all of this there comes, out of the ashes, a method that is neither wholly one lab's or the other's but a hybrid with features that are completely unique.

So this is what has been taking up my time and I will post the results of my investigations soon, hopefully but for now this will have to suffice. I do want to leave you with this. Staining methods, no matter how old it is or how well used is perfect. Improvements can always be made.

C.L. Andrews