Why Professional Pathology Services are Important

Patients do not usually get to meet or interact with the pathologists who handle the analysis of their laboratory results. This might lead some to undervalue the latter—which should never be the case. In fact, these doctors working in the background play a very important role in treating and caring for patients. Here are a few reasons why:

The Services of an Anatomic Pathology Laboratory

For any reputable medical facility, the assistance of an anatomic pathologist is an important component of making an accurate diagnosis. Anatomic pathologists excel at observing human tissue samples extracted by a patient's doctor and then taking note of any defects or diseases through a series of tests. Here are two of the most common diagnostic services that anatomic pathology laboratories offer to their clients:

The Importance of Pathology

Pathology is an incredibly important field in medicine, as it focuses on the causes and development of diseases, as well as how these affect health and the human body. Doctors would be practically crippled in doing their jobs if they did not have pathologists or pathology laboratory services backing them up. Here are a few reasons why pathology is so crucial:

Testing for HPV

If you receive an abnormal Pap smear result and your doctor tells you that it may be due to an infection with HPV (human papillomavirus), you may start to worry about what it means for your health. You may have heard that HPV increases a woman's risk of cervical cancer, but an abnormal test result doesn't mean that you have cervical cancer now. HPV is a common virus, and four out of five people will be diagnosed with the virus in their lives. Most women who have it do not necessarily develop cervical cancer.

Preventive Health Screenings are Important

The concept of managing health often involves practices such as regular exercise and eating right. However, regular visits to your doctor for preventive care are an integral part maintaining a healthy lifestyle.

Regular check-ups are important—the earlier a doctor can detect and diagnose a condition, the easier it generally is to treat. Below are common health screenings recommended by the U.S. Preventive Services Task Force (USPSTF). Please talk to your physician for more information.

Three Common Types of Skin Biopsies

Cancer, inflammations, and abnormal growths on the skin are commonly diagnosed by a procedure called skin biopsy. This procedure involves the removal of a small skin tissue sample and its examination under microscope. Most skin biopsies involve minor surgery, and may require local anesthesia, although they usually don't require hospital stay.

There are several types of skin biopsies. A few examples are given below:

What is a Dermatopathologist?

A dermatopathologist is a medical doctor who specializes in diagnosing skin disorders under a microscope. His subspecialty is a combination of both dermatology, which is the diagnosis and treatment of skin, nail, and hair diseases, and pathology, which focuses on the identification of diseases. Dermatopathologists are like detectives, who need to make microscopic observations of skin cell and tissue samples, as well as evaluate the information given to them by the physician who performed the biopsy, to make a definitive diagnosis.