How Pathologists Accelerate Preclinical Research with Digital Pathology

Key benefits of digital pathology.


The Digital Transformation in Pathology

Nearly every workplace in the world has undergone digital transformation in the past few years. More employees than ever before have worked remotely with remarkable success. Similarly, there has been a shift towards digital rendering for industries that normally deal in physical models.

Preclinical digital pathology is one example of how the health industry has adopted 3D rendering. Researchers are no longer restricted to studying diseases in the real world. Now, they can do it all from the comfort of their computer.

Here’s how digital pathology is affecting preclinical pathology research and some of its benefits.

What Is Digital Pathology?

Digital pathology refers to an image-based environment that enables someone to study and manage pathology information. The information used is generated from a digitized glass slide that can be manipulated or rendered static.

With the right digital pathology software, you can increase your throughput for scanning glass slides, consult with other pathologists, and share your findings. This type of pathology is suitable for diagnosing individuals, training medical students, and collaborating with your peers.

More researchers than ever before are turning to digital pathology to educate others and improve the efficacy and speed of their work. There are three main drivers pushing for the continued development of digital pathology. These include better AI, more powerful computer systems, and improved costs.

The Advantages of Preclinical Digital Pathology

The digitization of pathology is a boon for the entirety of the healthcare industry. Physicians and researchers won’t have to worry about preserving physical glass slides, as everything gets digitized and uploaded. Those glass slides can then be duplicated with ease and worked on separately.

It’s especially beneficial for research organizations and pharmaceutical companies, which may need to analyze millions of samples before developing viable drugs.

Reduced Waiting Times

One of the biggest benefits of digital pathology research is the shorter wait times. Getting pathology results from normal methods might take weeks. With modern technology, you can get results in a matter of hours or days.

This is all thanks to high-throughput, high-speed scanners, and software. Automated AI technology helps to speed up the workflow. Pathologists can get access to patient information much more easily and collaborate with other pathologists around the world.

All this amounts to much quicker turnaround times.

Increased Diagnostic Precision

Using physical slides with a magnifying glass is the traditional method when studying tissue samples. However, digital pathology allows for a much more accurate and comprehensive analysis.

Digital slides can be viewed in high-resolution with better image quality and more detail. Pathologists get access to multiple viewing angles and options, including 3D imaging. They can leave notes for their other team members, as well.

In addition, the software you use may come with digital image analysis tools. For example, it may be able to perform some of the more repetitive aspects of the job, such as counting how many cells are on a slide. This allows you to arrive at the final diagnosis much faster.

Faster Treatment

As a result of shorter waiting times and increased precision, patients benefit from faster treatment options. Before digital pathology, it could take up to twelve weeks to get results. That is partly due to requiring in-person evaluations and testing.

Quicker turnaround times are especially important when dealing with more serious illnesses, such as cancer. Additionally, patients can view their pathology findings and talk with their pathologist online.

Increased Efficiency

Using preclinical digital pathology tools is about more than convenience or connecting patients to their results faster. It also allows pathologists to work more efficiently with fewer delays or errors.

In addition, different team members can collaborate from a distance using screen sharing and chat functionality. Since the slides they are working with are digital, they can easily send over a copy to use on their computer.

Reduced Costs

Savings can be realized by conducting digital pathology research in a variety of ways.

First, you will have much shorter turnaround times since you can communicate and share slides with other researchers over the internet. Second, you won’t have to worry about packing and labeling glass slides. You also avoid the issue of potential breakage or loss.

As a result of eliminating those concerns, researchers will be more inclined to consult with other experts. Similarly, there’s less risk of your administrative staff mishandling glass slides. They also don’t have to manually sort them, as your digital program helps with that.

Space Saving

With digital pathology, any glass slides you work with end up digitized on your network and program. You don’t need to store them anywhere, which helps you save space. Since everything is available online, that also opens the possibility of working from home or an entirely different office.

Digital Pathology Advancement

Although the idea of digital pathology has existed for decades, it continues to grow at a remarkable speed. Modern technologies promise to bring out the full potential of the field. In addition, the growing prevalence of diseases and a demand for new drugs and medicines have encouraged research and development.

For example, preclinical pathology research currently allows clients to run deep-learning applications to answer any questions they may have. In the future, they will be able to follow a compound’s creation throughout the entire research process.

It’ll allow for greater collaboration as well as better results in medicine and research overall.

Improved Preclinical and Toxicologic Pathology

Today’s pathology needs innovative approaches along with the increasing digital technological innovations to improve quality, productivity, and collaboration. Increased productivity is the key to an intelligent preclinical digital pathology solution. It also improves lab throughput. With the right software, you can digitize slides, store them, share them, and improve diagnostic accuracy.

Xybion offers solutions for your lab including a digital management system, digital pathology, and more. In particular, our digital pathology software will provide competitive and productivity advantages for your lab. Book your free demo today and discover how a digitized slide using the latest pathogen identification technology can improve slide processing, streamline workflows, and increase throughputs for all preclinical studies.

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