Diagnosis of B-Cell Non-Hodgkin Lymphomas with Small-/Intermediate-Sized Cells in Cytopathology

Figure 2

Hand position during the one-step smear with touch-off which allows multiple smears to be produced from a single fine-needle sample. The sample is expelled from the needle and placed near the frosted end of the “receiver” slide (1). The “spreader” slide (2) is then lowered in a hinge-like fashion onto the receiver slide from above, allowing the sample to disperse by capillary action, and then drawn down the length of the receiver slide producing the characteristic “bullet shape with feather edge.” If using the touch-off technique, the spreader slide is lowered to pick up a small amount of the specimen and then turned over so that a clean glass surface can be used to spread the remaining sample on the receiver slide. The picked up sample on the reverse of the spreader slide (arrow) is then used to generate a second smear.