Comparison of Picrosirius Red Staining With Second Harmonic Generation Imaging for the Quantification of Clinically Relevant Collagen Fiber Features in Histopathology Samples.

Stromal collagen alignment has been shown to have clinical significance in a variety of cancers and in other diseases accompanied by fibrosis. While much of the biological and clinical importance of collagen changes has been demonstrated using second harmonic generation (SHG) imaging in experimental settings, implementation into routine clinical pathology practice is currently prohibitive. To translate the assessment of collagen organization into routine pathology workflow, a surrogate visualization method needs to be examined.