National Pathology Week and International Pathology Day 2014

On the 5th November 2014, as part of National Pathology Week and International Pathology Day, the Centre for Comparative Pathology at the University of Edinburgh (which includes both medical and veterinary pathologists) held a public engagement event for invited schools called "Pathology in Action: Disease, Dissection and Diagnosis". Forty-nine school students, aged 16 and 17, plus their teachers, came from 11 Lothian schools to the Pathology Department of the Royal (Dick) School of Veterinary Studies at the Easter Bush Campus for the afternoon.

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After lunch, the students were split into four groups and rotated around four different activities. The first activity was in the veterinary necropsy room, where they watched the post-mortem dissection of a sheep, including examination of the individual organs and were able to handle organs, such as kidney, brain and heart. The second activity was in the Dissection Room, where they were able to handle pre-prepared dissected specimens, showing abnormalities such as endometrial hyperplasia and leiomyoma in the uterus of a goat, and a football-sized ovarian granulosa cell tumour from a cow. Thirdly, they congregated around a multi-headed microscope where, under the guidance of a pathologist, the pupils and teachers were able to view glass slides of blood films, cytological preparations and histopathological sections showing a range of pathological abnormalities. The fourth group worked on a microbiological laboratory identification exercise called “Pathogens Up Close”, examining bacteria grown from a milk sample from a suspected case of bovine mastitis. Gram-stained slides of the bacteria had been prepared and the students were asked to distinguish Gram-positive from Gram-negative cocci. Students performed a catalase test with hydrogen peroxide, a clumping factor test and a DNAse test usingloops of the bacteria. They also used pre-prepared sheep blood agar plates to perform hyaluronidase and haemolysis tests, before assessing the accumulated results to identify the bacteria as Staphylococcus aureus.

The afternoon concluded with a series of three 10 minute presentations by pathologists on developing a career in veterinary pathology, marine mammal pathology, and medical pathology and forensic pathology..

The students and teachers provided strongly positive feedback. Of the pupils 79% rated the day ‘excellent’ and the other 21% ‘good’ while 100% of the teachers rated it ‘excellent’.

Comments from the students included ‘really interesting day with great hands on stuff’, ‘well explained, very informative’ and ‘Loved it!!’ The teachers’ responses included: ‘It was lovely to see my pupils so engaged - they loved it’, ‘I had a pupil talk non stop about this. I’ve taught her for 2 years and she barely spoke!’, ‘Truly Brilliant’ and ‘My pupils are completely energised and enthused with updated knowledge of pathology’.

A short video of our Pathology in Action event

Download a report for our Pathology in Action event