fallopian tube

[schmeggege]

Had a complete hysterectomy and 10c benign tumor was removed from my right ovary April 11.

A pathology report came back to my gyno oncol surgeon - "something" was found on my left fallopian tube and my course of treatment may have to be altered. I have a post op appointment with gyno onc on April 23 and will ask in depth questions. I think he mentioned in situ carcenoma but he needed to discuss some more with pathologist. Talked about lymph nodes being removed which means more surgery and some chemo. By the way, he did talk to pathologist briefly while we were there but wants to review my report again with him before my appointment.

Question: Why isn't all tissue biopsied in the operating room?  What are your thoughts on this? In the meantime, I am very scared again.  Thank goodness no ovarian cancer but what about fallopian tube cancer?

Thank you

[Neta100]

Hi there.  Usually they make a biopsy of different parts so they can know for sure if there is cancer in another part.  I am scheduled to be operated of ovarian cysts and the oncologist told me that first they had to take a biopsy of the affected ovary and then take like 10 or 12 more biopsies to get checked and not take any risks.

Hope this helps.

Neta

[Annekathryn Goodman, M.D.]

Hi There,
Thank you Neta for your clear answer.
it takes about a week to get a full pathology report. All the tissue is "fixed' in formaldehyde. The tissue is then cut into little pieces and placed in a wax like substance called paraffin. This makes 'paraffin blocks". Thin flakes of paraffin embedded tissue is then placed on a glass slide and stained with a dye that high lights the nucleus of the cell as purple and the surrounding cytoplasm of the cell as pink. Probably for a hysterectomy there can be 20 to 50 slides depending of the size of the specimen.

In the operating room a quick frozen section is taken. That would be only one section out of many in the operating room.

take care