Undecalcified preparation of bone tissue: report of technical experience and development of new methods

For reliable quantitative and qualitative analysis of bone specimens undecalcified preparation is essential. The "conventional" technique for this purpose is embedding in methylmethacrylate. Larger bone specimens, highly sclerotic specimens, cortical bone or bone implants consisting of metals or ceramics require modifications of this technique or completely new methods. We report our experience with the undecalcified preparation of 47,700 bone specimens. New techniques such as the cutting of large area sections up to a size of 5 x 6 cm and grinding procedures for completely artefact-free preparation which are applied in special cases are also described. A new technique of combined two- and three-dimensional analysis of bone specimens is presented. In our experience these methods are fundamental for morphological investigation of bone.