Introduction to Biomedical Science Portfolio

Section 1: Lecture Tasks

Task 2:

According to section 2 (Appropriate consent: children) of human act 2004, it is -necessary to take appropriate consent in the context of the activities related to taking relevant material from the living or deceased children. Under this section, the person who is under 18 should be considered as children. If the living child is competent then he can give his own consent.

However if they are not competent, then appropriate consent will be taken from the parents. In the case, in which the child died but has made advance decision to give or refuse the consent, then it will be applicable (Oliver, 2015).

Moreover, under subsections (4) to (6) the consent provided by the competent child must be in writing and witnessed regarding using his or her body for the purpose of anatomical examination or for public display. Only competent children can give his or her consent to use his or her own body for anatomical examination or public display of the whole body, or a material which of a body.

If a child has died then the consent for use of the organs for transplantation, should be taken from parents and if there is no-one with parental responsibility, then qualifying relationship can give the consent regarding the removal, storage or use of the child’s body or material from the body (Greene, et al., 2015). According to section 3 (Appropriate consent: adults) of human act 2004, if the adult is alive then his own consent will be necessary.

So, according to subsections (3) to (5) after the death of the adult’s consent will be required on the basis of advance writing and witness for anatomical examination or public display (Chou, et al., 2017). However if the adult has not made any prior decision, then according to section 4, the nominee can make the decisions. In the absence of nominee, qualifying relationship can give the consent under section 54(9).

At the same time, under section 4 (Nominated Representatives), if there will two or more people as a nominated representative, then it is assume that they will act alone unless the appointment says to act as jointly. The consent of one of several nominated representatives is sufficient for making the activity lawful, even in the situation where others object.

In like manner, section 5 (Prohibition of activities without consent) states that any activity which is undertaken without the appropriate consent will be penalized which means taking the consent for using the material for one purpose but be used for another will be penalized (Chou, et al., 2017).

According to subsection (2), a person who intentionally makes a false representation regarding the consent has been given or is not needed will be penalized under Anatomy Act 1984. Under the section 6, for the activities involving material from adults who lack capacity, in this context, the regulations will be taken into the account of the Mental Capacity Bill which is introduced in the House of Commons on 17 June 2004.

At the same time, under section 7: Powers of court to dispense with the need for consent and subsections (1) to (3), court allows the human tissue authority for offering the direction deeming e in relation to relevant material of a living person, who is untraceable, or has not responded towards the requests for consent to use his material. However the material will remain assistive to offer information which may remain relevant for the other person (Balmayor, et al., 2016).

Moreover, under subsection (4), Secretary of State offers a similar power to use relevant material or a body for the health-related research. However this power will only be exercised in rare or unusual cases. Under section 43, preservation for transplantation is lawful. At the same time, under section 45(1), it is an offence to analyze the DNA without qualifying the consent. Additionally, there is certain material which is outside the scope of the offence (de Souza, et al., 2013). For instance, using a material from a person, who died more than 100 years ago.

Task 3:

HCPC (Health & Care Professions Council) currently regulate 16 health and care professions. These professions are arts therapists, biomedical scientists, chiropodists/podiatrists, clinical scientists, dietitians, hearing aid dispensers, occupational therapists, operating department, practitioners, orthoptists, paramedics, physiotherapists, practitioner psychologists, prosthetists, radiographers, social workers in England and speech and language therapists (HCPC, n.a.)

According to HCPC (n.a.), all of these professions should have at least one professional title which should be protected by law. For instance, anyone using the titles ‘physiotherapist’ or ‘dietitian’ then he or she should be registered with HCPC. Moreover, according to HCPC range of set standards, it is a criminal offence to claim that he is registered with the council when they are not.

Additionally, using the protected title which an individual is not entitled to use is also a criminal offence. HCPC takes action against the person who commits these crimes. At the same time, if a registrant does not meet the standards of the council then the council can take action which can include stopping them from practicing (HCPC, n.a.).

Moreover, HCPC offers customer care services too so if the customer remains unhappy with the care or services offered by the professional, then they can raise the concern about the behavior of the registrant. This standard supports to always provide the best quality service by the council to all the stakeholders. Moreover, the Quality Management System is registered with BSI to ISO 9001: 2008 which supports to provide the best customer service.

Task 4:

 Biomedical scientists work to analyze the specimens from the patients for the purpose of providing the data to help doctors to diagnose the disease and to treat it in an adequate manner. According to Martin, et al. (2014), the audience for HCPC is education providers, Employers, journalists and media, members of the public, prospective registrants and registrants.

There are some standards of the proficiency which every biomedical scientist must meet to become registered. In this context, Biomedical Scientists should have at least one professional body or association. These organizations should include promoting the professional, representing the members, curriculum frameworks, post registration education and training and continuing professional development (Breeze, et al., 2014).

However, as these organizations are separate from the HCPC, so their role can be complementary. Moreover, once the registration completed, biomedical scientists should continue in a manner so that the standards of proficiency will meet which are relevant to the scope of a practice regarding Biomedical while utilizing their knowledge and skills to practice safely and in adequate manner.

Task 7:

Periodic Acid-Schiff (PAS)

PAS is a staining method which is used for the purpose of detecting the polysaccharides such as glycogen, and mucosubstances such as glycoproteins, glycolipids and mucins in tissues. PAS staining method remains helpful to stain the structure which contains high proportion of carbohydrate macromolecules. This stain is typically found in connective tissues, mucus, glycocalyx and basal laminae (Morgan, et al., 2014).

Van Geisen

 Van Gieson’s stain is the mixture of picric acid and acid fuchs in which is used for the purpose of differentiating the stain of collagen and other connective tissue (Stain, et al., 2015).

Perls Prussian Blue

Prussian blue is a stain which is used by the pathologists for detecting the presence of iron in biopsy specimens (Garcia-Pelagio, et al., 2017). This stain is used as separate solutions of potassium ferrocyanide and acid to stain the tissue.

Masson’s Trichrome

Trichrome is a method of histological staining. Under this method, different tissues are stained in which each one of three different colors. This method supports to distinguish cells from surrounding connective tissue. This staining method is majorly used for muscular pathologies (Morgan, et al., 2014).

Giemsa

Giemsa stain is used for the purpose of differentiating the nuclear and cytoplasmic morphology of platelets as well as RBCs, WBCs, and parasites too (Stain, et al., 2014).

Alcian Blue

This stain is used to stain acidic polysaccharides such as glycosaminoglycans. This staining can be combined with not only H&E staining but also with PAS staining and van Gieson staining methods. (Garcia-Pelagio, et al., 2017)

Ziehl-Neelson

This is a special bacteriological stain and it is majorly used for identifying the acid-fast organisms, especially, Mycobacteria (Stain, et al., 2015).

Task 10:

Example 1:

The genetic information is belonging to the individual whose sample is taken for the test. In the context of example 1: doctor should inform John and Sarah that there is a 25% chance that any future child will be affected. However, future child will only be affected if John also carries the defective gene and this is very rare situation. So, doctor should tell John about this finding as it will support them to minimize the situation of stress.

At the same time, according to the statutes, UK compel the doctors to disclose the confidential information to the individual as according to legal consideration there is a need of maintaining person’s bodily integrity (Greene, et al., 2015). Moreover, it is a right of competent adults to choose whether or not to undergo medical interventions.

Example 2:

The doctor should not tell Mary’s partner that he is not the father of her baby as under ethical consideration it is confidential information of her patient which she should not share with anyone else without her consensus (de Souza, et al., 2013).

However Mary’s partner is also the patient of same doctor but according to ethical consideration, it does not provide the right to share confidential information of an individual with others but still it is not an offence or crime.

Example 1 is completely different from example 2 as in first case, there is a need of disclosing the confidentiality however in second case there is a need of maintaining the confidentiality according to the ethical law.

Example 3:

This genetic information belongs to Ann as the diagnosis will take place of her by using the sample of her body. Muscular Dystrophy is inherited disease so there is chances of that the chromosomes belong to the family rather than only Helen.

References

Balmayor, E. R., Geiger, J. P., Aneja, M. K., Berezhanskyy, T., Utzinger, M., Mykhaylyk, O., … & Plank, C. (2016). Chemically modified RNA induces osteogenesis of stem cells and human tissue explants as well as accelerates bone healing in rats. Biomaterials, 87, 131-146.

Breeze, J., Poller, D. N., Gibson, D., Tilley, E. A., Cooke, L., Soar, E., & Repanos, C. (2014). Rapid on‐site assessment of specimens by biomedical scientists improves the quality of head and neck fine needle aspiration cytology. Cytopathology, 25(5), 316-321.

Chou, C. P., Chou, S. C., Chen, Y. H., Chen, Y. H., & Lee, M. S. (2017). Status quo of management of the human tissue banks in Taiwan. Cell and tissue banking, 18(1), 69-73.

de Souza, L. R., Melo, P. M., Paschoalin, T., Carmona, A. K., Kondo, M., Hirata, I. Y., … & Juliano, L. (2013). Human tissue kallikreins 3 and 5 can act as plasminogen activator releasing active plasmin. Biochemical and biophysical research communications, 433(3), 333-337.

Garcia-Pelagio, K. P., Moorer, M., Buo, A., Chen, L., Stain, J., & Bloch, R. (2017). Deficiency of the intermediate filament syemin causes abnormalities in striated muscle and reduces bone mass. The FASEB Journal, 31(1 Supplement), 1036-16.

Greene, C. S., Krishnan, A., Wong, A. K., Ricciotti, E., Zelaya, R. A., Himmelstein, D. S., … & Chasman, D. I. (2015). Understanding multicellular function and disease with human tissue-specific networks. Nature genetics, 47(6), 569-576.

HCPC (n.a.). About regulation. [Online] available at: http://www.hpc-uk.org/aboutregistration/ (Accessed at: 13 July 2017).

HCPC (n.a.). About us. [Online] available at: http://www.hpc-uk.org/aboutus/ (Accessed at: 13 July 2017).

Martin, J., Buttigieg, D., Silhavik, J., Flegar-Meštrić, Z., Adkins, A., Gasljevic, V., … & Adonics, A. (2015). Transnational Evaluation of a New Continuing Professional Development Activity for Biomedical Scientists Based on the International Organisation for Standardisation for Medical Laboratories ISO 15189. American Journal of Educational Research, 3(5), 637-642.

Morgan, V. A., McGrath, J. J., Jablensky, A., Badcock, J. C., Waterreus, A., Bush, R., … & Harvey, C. (2014). Psychosis prevalence and physical, metabolic and cognitive co-morbidity: data from the second Australian national survey of psychosis. Psychological Medicine, 44(10), 2163-2176.

Oliver, R. (2015). Policy Title: POLICY ON DISPOSAL OF HUMAN TISSUE. Policy.

Stain, S. C., Hoyt, D. B., Hunter, J. G., Joyce, G., & Hiatt, J. R. (2014). American surgery and the affordable care act. JAMA surgery, 149(9), 984-985.

Stain, S. C., Schwarz, E., Shadduck, P. P., Shah, P. C., Ross, S. B., Hori, Y., & Sylla, P. (2015). A comprehensive process for disclosing and managing conflicts of interest on perceived bias at the SAGES annual meeting. Surgical endoscopy, 29(6), 1334-1340.