**3.3 Technique: collection of smear**

	- a.Alcohol (70%) is adequate for fixation. Equal parts of ether and 95% ethyl alcohol give superior staining qualities.
	- b.Immediately immerse the slide in fixative or put the fixative on the slide with a dropper. Do not allow any drying of the smear before fixation.
	- c.Keep the slide in fixative for a minimum of 30 min.
	- d.At this point, the slides can be air dried and sent for staining and screening, or it can be left in the fixative.


#### *3.3.2 Advantages*


Deeper lesions are not identified by this technique, and for that another technique called fine needle aspiration cytology (FNAC) is used.
