ABSTRACT
Formal saline and saturated sodium chloride solutions were evaluated and compared as tissue fixatives in a quest of finding a safer and cheaper alternative to formaldehyde. Livers and testes dissected from 20 male rats allotted to 4 groups of 5 animals each were fixed for 12hrs, 24hrs, 48hrs and 7days in either standard formal saline (control) or formal saline prepared with table salt or saturated sodium chloride solution prepared with laboratory salt or saturated sodium chloride solution prepared with table salt and labeled as groups A, B, C and D respectively. The livers and testes were processed routinely and stained with H&E. The histological features (such as good staining, morphological appearance of the nucleus and cytoplasm etc) observed in the liver sections were not significantly different across the fixative groups at all fixative periods while those observed in the testes sections fixed in formal saline (both the standard and the one prepared with table salt) were significantly higher than those fixed in saturated sodium chloride solutions (both from laboratory and table salt) P<0.001. Histomorphometric evaluations of the Area and Diameter of seminiferous tubules were significantly higher in testes fixed in formal saline (prepared with table salt) and those fixed in saturated sodium chloride solutions (both from laboratory and table salt) than the control group of standard formal saline P<0.05. The height of germinal epithelium was significantly lower in testes fixed in formal saline with table salt and those in saturated sodium chloride solutions (both from laboratory and table salt) than the control group of standard formal saline P<0.05. So we conclude that the saline in formal saline could be replaced with table salt to enhance its performance on the fixation of liver and testis tissues of adult male wistar rats, saturated sodium chloride solution (both from laboratory and table salt) could be used to fix liver tissues for routine H&E demonstration for up to 48hours but not for testes of adult male wistar rats