title: Using cytology to increase small animal practice revenue.
abstract: Diagnostic cytology is a useful, noninvasive test with practical foundations in high-quality medicine and applications to practice building. Cytology will generate practice revenue whether assessed in-house or sent to a clinical pathologist. Thorough in-house evaluation is adequate in some cases, but expert opinion is important in many cases. Specimen slides should at least be reviewed in-house for assessment of cellularity and potential artifacts before submission to a reference laboratory. Reference laboratories also provide special stains and advanced molecular diagnostics to help further characterize many neoplastic processes, search for organisms, identify pigments, and address other important aspects of the lesion.
authors.affiliation: VDx Veterinary Diagnostics, 2019 Anderson Road, Suite C, Davis, CA 95616, USA. Electronic address: jhodges@vdxpathology.com.
authors.forename: Joanne
authors.initials: J
authors.lastname: Hodges
mesh_terms: D000820:Animal Diseases / Q000175:diagnosis / Q000473:pathology; D000818:Animals; D003142:Communication; D003584:Cytological Techniques / Q000379:methods / Q000592:standards / Q000662:veterinary*; D006762:Hospitals, Animal / Q000191:economics* / Q000592:standards
keywords: Cytology; Cytology artifact; Practice building; Staining techniques