Understanding Our Services
The Department of Pathology at Dana-Farber Brigham Cancer Center provides high-quality diagnostic services for a broad spectrum of medical conditions. Our physicians and laboratory staff provide an accurate and complete work-up of biopsy samples, blood draws, and other biospecimens so you receive the most specific and appropriate treatment. Our faculty and clinical fellows are frequently in dialog with medical oncologists and work hand-in-hand with surgeons, providing information and context that help to guide their care. Many of our faculty are internationally recognized experts who help to shape diagnostic practices, and many of them conduct cancer research. Essentially all are involved in teaching the next generation of pathologists and other physicians the skills they will need to understand how to recognize every form of cancer and personalize cancer care for each patient.
The Role of the Pathologist
A pathologist is involved in your medical care any time blood or another specimen is submitted to the clinical laboratory for tests, blood products are readied for transfusion, or a tissue is biopsied or excised for diagnosis.
For laboratory tests, pathologists are responsible for running the many hospital labs that measure blood chemistries, blood counts, and blood clotting parameters; evaluate for leukemias, lymphomas, myelomas, and markers of solid tumors; determine genetic mutations driving cancers; and culture samples for pathogens like bacteria. Pathologists ensure testing quality, personally interpret complex tests, and advise your treating physicians about ordering and understanding test results.
For example, a routine blood test may show abnormal cells; a pathologist may examine these cells using a combination of microscopy to see what the cells look like, flow cytometry to evaluate their protein expression profiles, and genetic studies to see what mutations they harbor. The pathologist then integrates these findings to make a specific diagnosis which in turn informs a treatment plan or may open the option to participate in a clinical trial to test a treatment-in-development.
If you are having a surgical procedure, your surgeon may rely on the skills of a pathologist to provide a rapid diagnosis during surgery. For example, pathologists can sometimes make a diagnosis in real time to guide the extent of a surgery to remove a cancer or enable other intraoperative decisions. Pathologists similarly can provide a comprehensive evaluation of tissue biopsies after they are taken. Biopsies can come from surgeries as well as outpatient procedures, like when a skin lesion is excised, or a mass or fluid collection is aspirated to retrieve a sample of cells.