medical student help deciding on an Olympus model please

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tchall
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Joined: Sat Sep 10, 2022 6:49 am

medical student help deciding on an Olympus model please

#1 Post by tchall » Sat Sep 10, 2022 7:21 am

Hello nice to meet you all
I am a medical student and would like to pick a microscope with a trioccular head to add a camera in later
Have been looking to get phase contrast and Dark field as well as the standard objectives and was hoping to get infinity and a x60
to look at blood and urine. phase contrast for the urine.

I have been looking at the amscope line
link:
https://www.aliexpress.com/item/4000035 ... 19835%21im

quite expensive

After reading your forum with intensity I see that a second hand Olympus may be a better option.
BH2 vs CX31 vs BX

Is it correct to say the the CHB range is the older and i should stick with BH2 CX or BX
could anyone give me any suggestions of what models to start with

I would appreciate any suggestions or help
many many thanks
TJ

PeteM
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Joined: Tue Dec 06, 2016 6:22 am
Location: N. California

Re: medical student help deciding on an Olympus model please

#2 Post by PeteM » Sat Sep 10, 2022 7:42 am

TJ - your budget might be the deciding factor. A BH2 might be in $1000 range, nicely equipped. For medical use a BHTU with DPlan or SPlan objectives and a trinocular head might be ideal. It might be that adding polarization and a wave plate would be better for imaging urine than phase contrast - though it obviously depends on what you're looking for. Many medical specimens end up being stained, reducing the need for phase contrast.

A BX might be in the $2000+ up range. Your budget won't stretch near as far as with the older BH2 series. The CX might enter into it if you find one with good Olympus UIS objectives at a bargain price.

There are equally good options from some of the other top makers. Should you really want phase contrast something like a Nikon Labophot or Optiphot, a Reichert Microstar IV, Leica DMLS or DMLB, or Zeiss Standard scope might open up more affordable options. Even Olympus CH2 phase scopes now seem to be going for near $1500 - the last one sold on Ebay went for $1490 with tax and shipping and had only two objectives. Some of these other brands might be under $1K including phase contrast.

Should you wish a copy of the guide to microscope brands and models we use for mentors in our local "Micronaut" program, feel free to send me a message once you have enough posts to do so.

Tom Jones
Posts: 336
Joined: Wed Apr 13, 2016 3:47 pm

Re: medical student help deciding on an Olympus model please

#3 Post by Tom Jones » Sat Sep 10, 2022 9:06 pm

A BH2 will serve you nicely. I used one in a clinical lab for 20 years or so. All of the extras you mention are readily available. DPlans are quite nice with really flat fields, SPlans are even nicer, but generally overkill clinically.

A couple of things though. I've never seen anyone use phase for urines, and I've done many thousands. Some labs may though. It would be handy doing manual cell counts of body fluids, but that's pretty much it. It's not actually necessarily there either as the differentials are done on wright-stained smears.

60x objectives are rare. I've never used one, or even seen one in a clinical lab. 10x and 40x max with wet urines or 100x with stained smears like gram stains. 40x or 50x (preferably oil) and 100x oil for blood and body fluid smears. 60x will narrow the field of view quite a bit without giving you the detail more easily seen at 100x. 40x/50x and 100x for gram stains. Always a 10x "finder" objective to locate the part of the slide you want to look at and to assess smear quality. Add a 4x and maybe a 2x if you're looking at tissue sections.

Darkfield is fun for protists and the like, but unless you intend to set up for spirochetes, it won't really add anything to your clinical toolkit.

A BX40 will cost you more, but some of the accessories can be a little easier to find. They've been in clinical use since the 1990's. I've built up and sold two of them to a hospital I used to work at for pathology. Plan objectives are quite adequate. Fluorites are nicer, but pricier and unnecessary.

DrPhoxinus
Posts: 316
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Location: Rochester Hills, MI

Re: medical student help deciding on an Olympus model please

#4 Post by DrPhoxinus » Sat Sep 10, 2022 9:30 pm

In terms of urine, American Optical sold a lot of scopes equipped with a dark field condenser. It was a good way to see spirochetes.

I bought a scope used and in the case was a paper for viewing spirochetes

lorez2
Posts: 113
Joined: Wed Apr 21, 2021 2:06 am

Re: medical student help deciding on an Olympus model please

#5 Post by lorez2 » Sun Sep 11, 2022 2:36 pm

Tom Jones and PeteM have offered sound advice, based upon a great deal of experience .

I have a couple of BH2 scopes that could be configured as you need them, but I may not have all of what you want.

If you are in the USA and are interested, send me a note.

lorez2
Nikon 80i

tchall
Posts: 6
Joined: Sat Sep 10, 2022 6:49 am

Re: medical student help deciding on an Olympus model please

#6 Post by tchall » Mon Sep 12, 2022 12:37 am

Thank you very very much
And certainly much appreciated
Would appreciate your fine tuning help please.

I am based in Australia so parts a little more difficult to come by as we have to deal with all the kangaroos

The reason for the phase contrast on urine is for specifically the casts and crystals.

I have decided on a BH2
With: S plan objectives X4, x10, X20 ,x40, and x100 oil immersion.
It has a tri ocular head

The seller is a retired pathologist and he will throw in also the phase contrast module.

I have some questions and I will include some photos

1) Would I need a specific x40 phase contrast objective or are the s plan objectives without the PL notation sufficient for Phase contrast.
If not what one objective at c 40 would suffice ?

2) would I also need the aligning eyepiece ?

3) my plan is to add a digital usb camera connected to laptop or lcd. Not a photographic camera.
I have done reading here about using a amscope 18mp with a reducing lenses 0.35 or would a 0.5 be better?
Would anyone have any other suggestions for to add a usb camera to this setup and what would be the best option?
See attached pics

Very much appreciated
Regards TJ
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tchall
Posts: 6
Joined: Sat Sep 10, 2022 6:49 am

Re: medical student help deciding on an Olympus model please

#7 Post by tchall » Mon Sep 12, 2022 1:12 am

I really don’t understand what I would need

Would I need a
MTV-3
Or a
U-PMTVC
Or a
U-PMTVC with a U-SPT

Or a nfk 2.5

What has this chap used and would the result be any good ?
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Tom Jones
Posts: 336
Joined: Wed Apr 13, 2016 3:47 pm

Re: medical student help deciding on an Olympus model please

#8 Post by Tom Jones » Mon Sep 12, 2022 3:27 am

You will need specific phase contrast objectives, The condenser alone is not enough. An offset phase ring will give you pretty nice oblique contrast which sometimes can show as much and be more pleasant than phase.

Be aware too, that unless the labs you normally work with use phase contrast for urines, you will probably see and call things casts that do not show up under normal observation methods. In essence, what is the standard? Who will be wrong if you see something and the lab does not because they use a standard, less sensitive method? What method was/is used to establish the normal clinical values? As bad as it sounds to microscopists, simply dropping the condenser down will increase contrast enough to ID cells as rbc's, lymphs or PMN's, and see hyaline casts. You lose some resolution, but more than make up for it with increased contrast. That's the reason microscopes used in hematology/UA labs often have beat up condenser carriers! WBC, RBC, and waxy casts are much easier to see. I actually did a couple of UA micros with phase a few weeks ago and they had a lot of junk show up in phase you couldn't see with normal methods. If you get phase objectives though, you can compare the methods for yourself.

For example, a trauma center I worked at checked all dipstick positive urine proteins with a more sensitive method, sulfosalicylic acid. A large percentage of those trace and 1+ dipstick positive were negative using sulfosal, and reported negative because of that. Dipstick positive bilirubins on the low end are often just from dark colored urine. When checked with Ictotest, those will be negative and should be reported that way. Some tests, actually many tests, sacrifice specificity for sensitivity. If you don't understand the problems you will get too many false positives, potentially treating patients for things they do not have. Eventually, UA test volume became so high that full automation was introduced and checking these things with a secondary method fell by the wayside. The physician community was advised to consider the low values with care as they were no longer being confirmed.

So if you are learning to find casts with a method that will make you think there are casts when they are not there, it's kind of defeating the purpose. If you're trying to learn, use the same methods others use. If you're doing research, that's a whole new ballgame.

I doubt phase will help with urinary crystals. Polarization will, and a full wave plate to ID monosodium urate monohydrate crystals (gout) vs. calcium pyrophosphate crystals (pseudogout) in joint fluids.

I'll let someone else school you on cameras. I've used DSLRs and now use mirrorless cameras. I want more resolution than I can get from USB or most reasonable priced dedicated microscope cameras, and don't need the research bells and whistles and high-dollar software that goes with them. I also want minimum 4k 24p video.

tchall
Posts: 6
Joined: Sat Sep 10, 2022 6:49 am

Re: medical student help deciding on an Olympus model please

#9 Post by tchall » Mon Sep 12, 2022 5:58 am

Thank you very much Tom
Much appreciated
Will look forward to someone’s suggestions in cameras
Many many thanks
TJ

annissteversonfir57
Posts: 13
Joined: Wed Sep 14, 2022 9:53 pm

Re: medical student help deciding on an Olympus model please

#10 Post by annissteversonfir57 » Tue Oct 25, 2022 7:31 pm

Tom Jones wrote:
Sat Sep 10, 2022 9:06 pm
A BH2 will serve you nicely. I used one in a clinical lab for 20 years or so. All of the extras you mention are readily available. DPlans are quite nice with really flat fields, SPlans are even nicer, but generally overkill clinically.

A couple of things though. I've never seen anyone use phase for urines, and I've done many thousands. Some labs may though. It would be handy doing manual cell counts of body fluids, but that's pretty much it. It's not actually necessarily there either as the differentials are done on wright-stained smears.

60x objectives are rare. I've never used one, or even seen one in a clinical lab. 10x and 40x max with wet urines or 100x with stained smears like gram stains. 40x or 50x (preferably oil) and 100x oil for blood and body fluid smears. 60x will narrow the field of view quite a bit without giving you the detail more easily seen at 100x. 40x/50x and 100x for gram stains. Always a 10x "finder" objective to locate the part of the slide you want to look at and to assess smear quality. Add a 4x and maybe a 2x if you're looking at tissue sections.

Darkfield is fun for protists and the like, but unless you intend to set up for spirochetes, it won't really add anything to your clinical toolkit.

A BX40 will cost you more, but some of the accessories can be a little easier to find. They've been in clinical use since the 1990's. I've built up and sold two of them to a hospital I used to work at for pathology. Plan objectives are quite adequate. Fluorites are nicer, but pricier and unnecessary.
I also really wanted to become a doctor. But fate took me in a different direction. But I'm not likely to change anything.
I also really wanted to become a doctor. But fate took me in a different direction. I was recently asked in college to write about lord of the flies, so I continue reading this here. I didn't want to just read the whole book. Sometimes I regret that I chose a completely different specialization. But I'm not likely to change anything.
Not a bad explanation

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