Clinical Laboratory: Anatomic Pathology

Anatomical pathology is the branch of medicine which involves the study of body organs and tissues i.e. the group of cells. Anatomical pathology is generally determined as one of the diagnostic branches of medicine along with the radiology and other pathology specialties like microbiology and chemical pathology. It has roles that include establishing the cause of some certain diseases and the effects that are having on the body, assisting with the choice of treatment which will be given, aiding in giving a diagnosis, prognosis and determining the reason or cause person’s death. Anatomical pathology is essential in those parts of medicine where a specimen of tissue or a sample of some tissue cells is taken from the respective patient and sent to the laboratory. In these situations anatomical pathology is the specialty that gives a definitive diagnosis and allows the clinicians to give the most appropriate advice and treatment to the patients. There are two main subdivisions for anatomical pathology. The first subdivision is the histopathology, which consists of the examination of sampled whole tissues under the microscope that is then often aided by the using of special staining techniques and other associated tests. The second subdivision is the cytopathology or cytology, which is the examination of single cells. A common general cytology test is the cervical smear.

Author(s): Rahman Abdur

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