Patient biopsies can be accidentally thrown away.
When I first started this job they didn’t save the trash, as was common practice at other jobs.
They tossed out a few biopsies, as happens once or twice a month, and couldn’t retrieve them because the trash was taken away the night before.
Now they save the trash. They save bags and bags of it. They save all of it for a week from every area and search it a couple times a week. Dozens of biopsies have been found. That might be wrong actually. Hundreds have probably been found.
A woman’s breast biopsy was thrown away – in the operating room.
The biopsy never made it to our lab or our trash.
Sometimes you just can’t win.
A Slice of You 