The Tissue Procurement Core Facility is designed as a central tissue acquisition and distribution facility. The Core enables the efficient collection and use of patient tissues and their subsequent distribution to project investigators. Services provided by the Core Facility include making initial patient contact and gaining informed consent, acquisition of pertinent patient information from chart and patient interview, clinical/pathological evaluation of collected tissues and the initial processing and distribution of tissues. Tissues for the Program Project are obtained from reproductive tracts of patients undergoing hysterectomy or endometrial biopsy. The Core Facility identifies and enrolls patients and evaluates the appropriateness of clinical cases. In addition, the facility oversees the collection of information on endocrine condition, clinical diagnoses, and gross pathology. The second major function of the Core Facility is to coordinate tissue processing and distribution. This function includes designation of tissues for investigators as well as the preparation of cell suspensions or vibratome sections where appropriate. Cell suspensions and vibratome sections are made separately from each of the following tissues: Fallopian tube, uterus, cervix, and vagina. The third function of this Core is the collation of patient data on selected clinical parameters including the maintenance of a project database to enable rapid correlation of clinical endocrinologic and immunologic parameters of different tissue samples. This database enables investigators to easily evaluate hypothesis that arise in the course of the research. This Core combines the expertise of its members will include a Core Director, a Medical Coordinator, and a Pathologist who provide consultation and support for all of the Core services. In addition, the Core has the services of a Clinical Coordinator who oversees the case load and collects clinical information, a Nurse Coordinator who contacts the patients to obtain clinical history, and three highly trained technicians who participate in tissue dissection, fixation, and disruption. The biostatistical shared service and the Norris Cotton Cancer Center at DHMC provide consultation for the statistical evaluations and maintenance of the database. A microbiologist, in conjunction with the Clinical Microbiology laboratories, provides consultation on the diagnosis and identification of sexually transmitted diseases (STD).
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