Background: Generally, in practical dermatology, the term artifacts is used to describe what is called pathomimia which means self-inflicted lesions or that lesions induced accidentally on oral mucosa and skin. Regarding dermatopathology, the word, ‘artefact' comes from the Latin term, ‘Ars' = art and ‘factum' = made. This study evaluates types of artifacts, frequencies, and their impact on final diagnosis.
Patients and method: This observational, cross-sectional study. The study worked on 590 dermatological slides, that stained with hematoxylin and eosin stain. Slides evaluated from archive and that collected during time of study which occur from June 2022 to November 2022, in Al-Yarmouk Teaching Hospital, Baghdad, Iraq, analyzed for artifacts under light microscope.
Results: Totally 590 slides were evaluated, only 69 (11.695%) show no artifacts. Slides with artifact(s) counting 521(88.305%). Histopathological artifacts were accounted for 931 because more 45% of total examined slides show two or more artifacts. Folding artifacts were the most common type, while artefacts related to fixation were the least 307(32.975%), 6(0.644%) respectively.
Conclusion: Histopathological evaluation of skin biopsies had long, and multiple stages done by the dermatologist, assistant pathologists, and lab technicians. That led to increased incidence of errors and artifacts. Artifacts invariably occur in the majority of dermatopathological slides and may interfere with the interpretation of histopathological diagnosis. These artefacts should be recognized and do all effort to avoid or at least, minimized them, which yet defied even with soft tissue handle and wrong techniques avoidance.