Application of impression cytology to the diagnosis of conjunctival neoplasms

Conjunctival impression cytology using cellulose acetate filter paper was employed to obtain multiple samples of conjunctival epithelium from 192 normal and abnormal eyes. Modifications of an established technique were used and the impressions were stained by the Papanicolaou method and mounted on glass slides. The impressions were examined for their effectiveness in demonstrating the morphological characteristics of normal epithelium and the features of the more common conjunctival neoplasms. The technique was found to be successful at both removing cells and preserving cytologic features. It also had several advantages over other collection techniques. Overlapping cells were not a detrimental feature of the preparations from this study.