Digital analysis yields more reliable and accurate measures of dermal and epidermal thickness in histologically processed specimens compared to traditional methods |
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| Authors: | Sergey Y Turin Joanna K Ledwon Hanna Bae Adrian Buganza‐Tepole Jolanta Topczewska Arun K Gosain |
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| Institution: | 1. Lurie Children's Hospital of Chicago, Division of Plastic and Reconstructive Surgery, Northwestern Feinberg School of Medicine, Chicago, IL, USA;2. School of Mechanical Engineering, Purdue University, West Lafayette, IN, USA |
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| Abstract: | Changes in the thickness of the dermis and epidermis have been described in the scenario of tissue expansion as well as inflammatory skin processes (psoriasis, contact hypersensitivity and so on). These changes have previously been quantified using ocular micrometers to obtain and then average a limited number of spot measurements, leading to suboptimal accuracy. We describe a rapid method of using freely available ImageJ software to analyze digitized images of fixed skin specimens. By determining the cross‐sectional area and surface length of a skin layer, a simple calculation produces more accurate and reproducible measurements of its thickness compared to historical methods, with excellent inter‐rater reliability. |
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| Keywords: | digital expansion in vitro layer stretch |
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