Pathology is a specialized area of medicine that is concerned with the origins and causes of disease. If you are considering opening up a pathology lab, you will need the right equipment. Without high-quality medical machinery, you risk getting inaccurate and unreliable results.
Error-ridden results can be detrimental in a pathology lab. It could lead to the wrong diagnosis and, therefore, the wrong treatments being administered.
Of course, you’ll also need a great team of staff, but that’s a subject for another article! Here, we’re going to the key pieces of equipment that you’ll need for your pathology lab.
1. Freezers
When you’ve got multiple samples to process and analyze, you’ll need somewhere to store them.
Any pathologist will know that controlling the temperature of samples is essential to maintaining their quality. That’s why you’ll need at least one large controlled rate freezer.
Most freezers have pre-set temperatures, which ensures you can store your samples at the optimal temperature. This will maintain cell culture viability so you can get accurate, reliable results.
2. Microscopes
If there’s one piece of equipment that every pathology lab needs, it’s a microscope. In fact, most labs will need several microscopes to check multiple samples at once.
Microscopes are necessary to enlarge tiny cell or tissue samples so that you can analyze them in more detail. You’ll be able to spot any abnormalities in tissue cell structure or the presence of bacteria in a blood sample.
Without microscopes, it would be almost impossible to detect some diseases and illnesses. Make sure to invest in at least two or three microscopes that can magnify to a high level.
3. Centrifuges
If you need to separate the various components of blood in a sample, a centrifuge is exactly what you’ll be using. It’s a sophisticated piece of machinery that separates your sample according to density, making it possible for you to analyze a small section of the cells and tissues.
There are different types of centrifugal machines that you can get. The best one for your pathology lab will depend on your specific needs.
4. Incubators and Water Baths
Just like you have got your freezers to keep your cell and tissue samples cool, you will also need something to keep them warm.
Incubators and water baths are used to heat your samples to the optimal temperatures for cell health and growth. They can also be used to heat flammable chemicals prior to using them.
Your incubators are essential to maintain or speed up the growth of your samples. If your cell cultures aren’t kept at the perfect temperature, you risk the cells dying or the sample being unusable and ending up in the medical waste bin.
Incubators and water baths can be set to a specific temperature and humidity to provide the environmental conditions for your sample to grow. Often, growing a cell sample is necessary for its testing and analysis.
Both incubators and water baths come in varying sizes and styles. Make sure to find an option that is large enough to meet the demands of your pathology lab.
