Pathology is a branch of science that deals with the study of disease at a tissue level. It elaborates all the abnormal changes that take place inside the system, leading a body towards a disease. It makes a person understand the abnormalities that can occur inside the body.

We perform our daily routine functions when our body works properly. If our body does not work accordingly, then we will become unable to enjoy a healthy life. The inability of the body or body systems to perform appropriately is the result of any underlying abnormality.

In the field of science, this abnormal functioning of the body is termed pathology. It also explores the causes of disease and their effects on the body.

Pathology is a vast term that encloses many aspects within it. Pathology includes the study of causes, symptoms, diagnosis, and outcomes of disease. More specifically pathology is referred to all the laboratory tests that are used to diagnose a disease. These includeBlood tests

Urine test

Sputum test

CSF test

Biopsy

Other specific organ tests like liver function test, thyroid function test, renal function test, etc.

All these come under the umbrella of pathology.

To understand the pathology of any organ system or tissue, one must always know about the normal functioning of that organ first. This allows one to decide whether the organ is working normally or abnormally.

Disciplines of Pathology

Pathology is classified into various disciplines depending upon the type of mechanisms that is affected by a disease.

It includes

General Pathology

In general pathology mechanisms of cell injury, cell death, trauma, inflammatory processes, and abnormal growths are studied. It is not specified to a particular system of the body, instead, it involves all the phenomena that occur in all the tissues of the body. For example

  • The cellular changes that occur during a cell injury
  • Types of cell death and their mechanism
  • Chemical mediators that are released during the inflammation
  • Mechanism of growth and spread of tumours
  • Intracellular calcifications and their types
  • Clotting disorders, their intrinsic and extrinsic pathways
  • Mechanism of hypersensitivity and its types
  • Autoimmune disorders

Special Pathology

 

In this, a disease associated with a particular organ system is studied for example

Diseases of the digestive system

It includes

  • Gastritis
  • Crohn’s disease
  • Cholera
  • Inflammatory bowel diseases etc

Diseases of the respiratory system:

It includes

Diseases of the nervous system:

It includes

  • Parkinsons disease
  • Alzheimer’s disease
  • Neurodegenerative diseases

Musculoskeletal disorders:

It includes

  • Arthritis
  • Muscular dystrophy
  • Osteoarthritis
  • Osteosclerosis
  • Paget’s disease
  • Rickets

Cardiovascular diseases

It includes

  • Endocarditis
  • Arteriosclerosis
  • Hypertension
  • Heart attack

Clinical Pathology

It deals with the study of body fluids and specimens for microscopic examination. It basically helps in the diagnosis of diseases. It includes the identification of all the cellular changes and pathological proteins that get incorporated into the body tissues or fluid as the result of any disease process. These tests are carried out in a laboratory, for example

  • Complete blood count
  • Bleeding time
  • Clotting time
  • And another lab test specific to a particular organ system.

Pathologist:

A pathologist is a medical person who examines the body tissues or specimens for diagnostic purposes. It is always a trained person in microbiology haematology, immunology, blood banking, etc.

Deep Secrets of Pathology you Should Know

There are about 100 top deep secrets of pathology in which lies the key pathology. One must know about the basics of this pathology before going into the depth of this field.

These include

  • Cell injury: Any damage to the cell or tissue
  • Cell death: It includes necrosis (accidental death) and apoptosis (programmed death)
  • Cellular changes: includes Hyperplasia (increase in the number of cells), hypertrophy (increase in the size of the cell), etc
  • Inflammation: Protective response of the body. It includes mediators of inflammation
  • Edema: Accumulation of fluid in the body
  • Thrombosis: intravascular clot formation that is localised to its site of formation
  • Virchow’s triad: it is a triad of
  1. Hypercoagulability
  2. Stasis of blood
  • Injury to vessel
  • Thromboembolism
  • DIC: stands for disseminated intravascular coagulopathy: In this condition, there is clotting of blood in small blood vessels of the body.
  • Infarct: Area of dead tissue due to the reduced blood supply.
  • Shock: A condition in which body tissues do not receive a sufficient amount of blood due to any reason
  • Hypersensitivity: Exaggerated immune response of the body
  • Autoimmunity: The body initiates its immune response against its own body cells
  • Cancer: Uncontrolled division of cells
  • Myocardial infarction: It is a heart attack

Frequently Asked Questions (FAQs)

u003cstrongu003eWhat do you mean by pathology?u003c/strongu003e

Pathology is a branch of science that deals with the study of disease, its causes, its underlying pathological processes and diagnostics tools to identify a particular disease.

u003cstrongu003eWhat are the four types of pathology?u003c/strongu003e

Pathology is a huge discipline. In order to understand it properly on the basis of its functions it is divided into four types.u003cbr/u003eForensic  pathologyu003cbr/u003eMolecular pathologyu003cbr/u003eClinical pathologyu003cbr/u003eAnatomical pathology

u003cstrongu003eWhat is an example of pathology?u003c/strongu003e

We eat food it is digested in stomach, passes through the intestines where further digestion and absorption of food takes place under the action several enzymes and hormones. it is stored in large intestine for a time being and then passed out in the form of feces. Any infection or abnormality in the motility of intestine or deficiency of some enzyme or hormone can lead to improper passage and absorption of food. That can lead to constipation, gastritis or diarrhea and many more diseases, these are the example of gastric pathology.

u003cstrongu003eWhat is pathology test?u003c/strongu003e

Pathology deals with the diagnosis of disease. For this purpose, it includes several laboratory tests that are used to find out the abnormal findings within the body fluids or tissue specimens. A pathology test needs collection of samples from the diseased person. Examination of this samples is termed as pathology test. For example liver function tests, complete urine examination, blood tests, sputum tests are all the examples of pathological tests.

u003cstrongu003eWhat is the importance of pathology?u003c/strongu003e

Pathology is important because it tells about the abnormal mechanisms that are going inside the body. These changes if not treated in time can result in disease. Pathology diagnose these changes through different pathological test and assist in the actual treatment of the disease. In case of infectious disease we can easily identify the causative microorganism through microscopic examination and then the specific antibiotic can be given.

u003cstrongu003eWhat procedures do pathologist do?u003c/strongu003e

Pathologist is a specialist that perform tests of pathology. It can do microscopic examinations of slides prepared by the patient’s samples. A pathologist also count the blood cells in blood sample to give the report of complete blood count. He runs different instruments that are used for diagnostic purposes like spectrophotometer, hemocytometer, glucometer etc.

u003cstrongu003eIs pathologist a doctor?u003c/strongu003e

Pathologist is not actually a doctor. Pathologist can only tell about the abnormality that is going inside the body but cannot prescribe a medicine to treat this pathology. He has a command on diagnostic tools not on medicines.

u003cstrongu003eWhat is qualification of pathologist?u003c/strongu003e

A pathologist is a specialist, he requires several years of qualification to become a pathologist. It includes four to five years of graduation after 12 years of education. After that he requires three to four years of studies only in the field of pathology. He also needs to spend few years in pathology subclass to become a specialist in pathology.  Apart from the curriculum he also requires two or more years of training in pathology labs.

u003cstrongu003eWho created pathology?u003c/strongu003e

A German scientist ‘’Rudolph Virchow’’ is called as a founder of pathology. He is a physician, politician as well as a reformer. He had a command in the field of cellular pathology.