page 26 Compass
™
Stainer Operator’s Manual
The Compass Stainer can store up to 15 staining protocols or programs, with the first one pre-loaded
and locked to accommodate the ThinPrep
®
Stain Protocol for use on the ThinPrep Imaging System.
Each program can have up to 35 steps. While running a program the user must place appropriate
reagents at proper stations for running a program. If the user desires to run multiple racks, only one
program can be used for all racks in that series of runs.
Parameter Definitions
While programming a processing step, the following five parameters are entered for each step:
1
Station Number
2
Duration
3
Is Station Time Critical or Not
4
Is Agitation needed upon Rack Entry or Not
5
Exit Speed of the Rack upon completion of the station time
Station Number:
The Compass Stainer has 24 stations. The stations are labeled as LOAD, UNLOAD
and Stations 1-22. At LOAD Station a new rack is placed by the user. The system places the slide rack
at UNLOAD Station upon completion of the staining program. While creating a Program, the user
does not program LOAD and UNLOAD stations – these stations are implied and are always added
in the Program. A valid Station Number value is between 1 and 22.
Duration:
The time duration for a step ranges from 10 seconds (00:10) to 99 minutes and 59 seconds
(99:59), programmable in 1 second increments. If a longer station time is desired, the user must select
the next step at the same station with the remainder of the time. The system will pick up the rack
momentarily out of the station and put it back in (with selected agitation).
Critical Time:
Criticality is a feature that ensures a rack is not left submerged in a station for longer
than the specified duration time. The selection choice is YES/NO. If the step is flagged as critical by
selecting the "Yes" option, the duration at the selected station will not be extended to accommodate
multiple rack processing.
Agitation:
Agitation is a feature that relies on the Transport Mechanism Arm to move the slide rack
in an up and down motion to ensure even stain distribution based on the agitation setting. Agitation
can be turned on or off for a station by selecting "Yes" or "No", respectively. Agitation is performed
only upon entry into a reagent station. Number of Agitation dips during agitation and the height of
the agitation dip are set up by a Utility Mode menu selection. These selections apply to all stations of
all programs.
