Development of an ultrasound-emitting device for performing rapid immunostaining procedures

Although intraoperative rapid diagnosis is conventionally performed using hematoxylin-eosin (HE)-stained specimens, the use of additional special staining, together with immunostaining techniques, has been examined in recent years to improve diagnostic accuracy. In intraoperative rapid diagnosis, immunostaining should be completed within 7-10 min, because the pathologist is typically presented with an HE-stained specimen within the same time period. We hypothesized that ultrasound may enhance antigen-antibody reactions and reduce the number of immunostaining steps. To clarify the ability of ultrasound to support immunostaining, we first created an ultrasonic generator specifically for immunostaining. Next, we explored the optimal conditions for immunostaining of formalin-fixed specimens to examine the utility of the ultrasonic generator. Finally, we tried immunostaining with the ultrasonic generator using frozen specimens to simulate intraoperative rapid diagnosis. We report herein that ultrasound enables immunostaining of frozen specimens in approximately 10 min.