Standard Operating Procedures (SOPs) have been developed in consultation with pathologists, scientists and ethicists to ensure practical, high-quality, standardized tissue collection and processing across all collection centres.

Ontario Tumour Bank staff control the process, from obtaining consent to collection, storage and data management. This enables them to bank consistently high-quality samples and clinical data while protecting patient-donor safety and privacy. Stringent quality control over samples and data is continuously enforced. Moreover, staff at the collection centres are trained quarterly on technical updates.

The Ontario Tumour Bank has developed and implemented protocols covering:

• tissue sample processing and archiving;
• patient data collection and patient identification protection;
• equipment maintenance; and
• sample distribution to qualified researchers.
  

These protocols are designed to maximize the molecular and histological quality of the samples.

Human Biospecimens

A diverse range of sample types and preparations are available, based on strict adherence to SOPs.

Sample Types and Preparation:

• Fresh frozen tumour tissue and normal-adjacent tissue (~250 mg/vial)
• Slides, wax sections and paraffin-embedded tissue blocks
• Cryopreserved plasma (1ml/vial) and buffy coat (~250µl/vial)
  
  

Facts and Figures

• Along with fresh-frozen tissues that are cryopreserved within 30 minutes post-resection, blood preparations are also stored in the vapour phase of liquid nitrogen at -196°C;
• An assortment of tumours at varying stages of cancer from over 35 disease sites is included in the biorepository (e.g., breast, colorectal, gynecological, head and neck, lung, lymphoma and skin cancers);
• All cases are verified by a pathologist;
• All samples are labelled with a bar code;
• Random quality assurance testing is performed on two per cent of all samples;
• Disease-specific electronic case report forms are used to record clinical information on each patient-donor.