Professional Development Inventory

Professional skills learned in:

Histopathology

A. Interpersonal skills
- It is important as a medical technologist to have good interpersonal skills. As
one of the most crucial tasks of a MT is to collect blood from the patients,
and most of the time patients are anxious about this especially pediatric,
geriatric, and sometimes even adults. Thus, it is essential to have strong
social skills as this could help in reducing stress, not only to the patients but
to the Medical Technologist as well. And it can also increase patients’
satisfaction. Apart from this, in Histopathology section, you are also working
with the Pathologists that requires you to be confident in talking with them
but still respectful.
- In my 2-week stay in the histopathology section of the Davao Doctors’
Hospital, I’ve been with the staffs assigned to the section and I’ve worked
with different interns from SPC and DDC. And gladly, I easily made friends
with them despite of the differences we’ve had. Along with, we’ve made a
great team working together in learning more about the section and in times
that problems arise.

B. Methodological/Test performance skills

- Most crucial part in the Histopathology section is labelling, in DDH, we were
very careful in logging the specimen we receive and the results released by
the pathologist.
- I learned the proper techniques in embedding and in fishing-out to avoid
bubbles, and better manipulation of the microtome.
- We were also taught on how to determine if the specimen is not properly
embedded or stained, and what course of action we should do.
 - I was able to observe the Pathologist in manipulating the cryostat for frozen
section.

C. QA system & validation of results

- In Davao Doctors’ Hospital, they don’t perform quality control in their
Autotechnicon and other machines. However, we’ve taught the daily
maintenance they do such as filtering the hematoxylin and eosin stains,
changing of the ethanol and other reagents, and the proper cleaning of the
microtome and embedding machine.

D. Correlational and diagnostic ability

- In Histopathology section, the task of the Medical Technologist is to make
well-prepared slides for the pathologist to read and release the results. Thus,
it is important that the slides we make are clean and accurate. Starting from
the correct labelling, properly performed fixation, dehydration, clearing,
impregnation, and embedding. Most importantly, properly stained slides are a
must. We must be meticulous so we are confident that all of the essential
margins can be viewed microscopically by the pathologist.