What are FFPE Tissue samples and where do they come from?
When a patient undergoes a procedure, an amount of tissue is removed from their body and studied by pathologists to determine what is causing the patient problems. When a tumor, for instance, is removed from the patient, it is said to be 'Grossed'. This is the physical description of what the surgeon sees. The grossed tissue removed cannot simply be slapped onto a slide for diagnosis, it needs to be specially prepared to make the fine structures within easier to examine under a microscope. Typically the tissue is cut to smaller pieces, fixed in formalin and embedded in wax to yield a Formalin Fixed, Paraffin Embedded block or FFPE . The wax (paraffin) supports the delicate tissue and allows it to be cut into thin sections that can be placed flat on microscope slides. These sections are then dyed with hematoxylin and eosin to create an H&E. An H&E is a slide that is stained so that a pathologist may be able to better make a diagnosis. FFPE blocks and H&E slides are quite stable and can be stored for long periods at room temperature. The preparation of FFPE blocks and H&E slides are well established international SOPs that have been used for more than 100 years, hence, many millions of these specimens exist in hospitals and archives all over the world. Once the pathologist has conducted his analysts, whatever is left over is referred to as remnant tissue. This material is usually stored by the hospital for some minimum time, after which it is considered to be waste material that has been legally abandoned by the donor, and it may be destroyed or otherwise disposed of in compliance with certain regulations.
Why is this tissue useful in research? What is Folio Bioscience's involvement with human tissue research?
You
can lean more about ordering tissue samples for use in research here.
Thanks to breakthroughs in molecular biology, even small amounts of remnant tissue can now be used for molecular analyses that yield useful information about what is going on inside diseased cells at a molecular level. This can lead to deeper understanding of disease and eventually produce new diagnostic tests, treatments and cures. The fact that hospitals can often accumulate large numbers of these samples makes these studies statistically powerful, and the fact that the researcher does not have to bother, inconvenience, or endanger a living patient also makes this research attractive and often preferable to using live human specimens.
Folio Biosciences is the commercial custodian of a human specimen biorepository (also called a biobank or tissue bank). Folio's primary purpose is to match tissue specimens with researchers, and this may be accomplished using the specimens housed in the repository or by acting as a broker or matchmaker between biomedical research scientists and an extensive network of repositories and partners in the biomedical sciences. Additionally, Folio may be involved with histological screening of specimens to make sure that they meet customer-specified criteria, and associated services such as sectioning, microscope slide preparation, staining, QC of biospecimens and medical data mining.
