During the last 15 years both diagnostic and therapeutic progress has been made in hematology and oncology like in no other area in internal medicine. The standard diagnostic methods include morphology, chromosome banding analysis, immunophenotyping, fluorescence-in-situ-hybridization, 24-color-FISH, PCR and real time PCR, as well as sequencing. Microarray-based gene expression analyses carry a significant potential for an essentially new diagnostic method in the near future. All of these techniques are established in the MLL.
The prompt examination and reporting is facilitated in the MLL by a comprehensive expertise and an intensive commitment for responsible work of each staff member. The concerted application of numerous specialized devices and techniques which can efficiently be used in the context of a large laboratory leads to diagnostic validity. Since the directions of further examinations is intensively influenced by the results of examinations already finished a consistent exchange of these results is essential for the valid and fast diagnosis. Furthermore, the acquisition of samples and their processing is guaranteed each day of the week.