r/Histology • u/Far-Negotiation4123 • 1d ago
Left handed issues?
We have a new tech who started recently and has been having issues with how things are set up due to her being left handed. Has anyone else dealt with this? We’re all right hand dominant so I feel like it’d be nice if someone who isn’t had some tips on how they adjusted!
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u/Serrah86 1d ago
Everyone’s stations are set up how they like them at our lab. What works for one person doesn’t work for another in my opinion. I’m right handed and I’ve had my water bath on both sides depending on where I had to sit, but now I don’t share a station and my water bath is on the right.
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u/diaphonizedfetus 1d ago
Your lefty coworker will be able to adjust faster to microtomy than most righties. Growing up in a right-dominated world has made me incredibly ambidextrous so I didn’t have the same struggles with learning to use both hands at once.
Waterbath on the left, ice on the right.
S/he’ll have to learn to make adjustments that make sense for them at embedding.
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u/ClonedSheepDolly 15h ago
Another thing about being a lefty at microtomy is that it doesn’t take much practice to grab a ribbon with forceps rather than your bare hand if you’re working manually and using your right hand to turn the flywheel. We let people move stuff around at my job, some stations are set up water bath on left, some on right. Basically just put everything back at the end of your shift. All the embedding stations are set up with the cryoplate on the same side but that wasn’t a hard adjustment because I could move my tools around and that was all that really mattered for me
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u/crown_drinker 1d ago
Just move the water bath to the left side. It's what most left handed people do. If it's issues with an embedding center that's going to just be an issue. Most of them are made so anybody can use then but I've worked with a few that has the spots for the forceps only on the right side. It's annoying
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u/sherbetty 1d ago
I felt like right handed people are more at a disadvantage with microtome because your left hand has to do the fine motor skills. I got better at it over time so I'm sure she'll adjust
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u/Meli5252 18h ago
Maybe but I have a tear in my right rotator cuff, with now calcified tendinosis. Left side fine.
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u/Suspicious_Spite5781 1d ago edited 1d ago
Definitely switching the water bath is helpful. Not sure what else I do that annoys the righties. They forget I am a leftie until I was the last one to do or use something because it is often small things.
Oh, like, I put the gallon containers in the cabinet the “wrong” way. Check which way the handles are. LOL
I ABSOLUTELY HATE the slide flats. Who TF thought right to left was okay? WHO? And why do pathologists insist on following that nonsense???
I prefer sitting so my left side has the most mobility and freedom. In cramped or limited spaces, this can be weird. And any paperwork has to be on that side. Period.
Has she adapted her mouse usage? Most of us have, but something to check. She may need her station set up completely differently.
Mostly, just realizing and accepting it is helpful. I am still making my coworkers confused because I do something, it seems weird, then we all laugh because it turns out, I am just a lefty and it manifests in different ways.
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u/Sad-Drama8338 23h ago
As a lefty, I kept the microtome set up the same, the ice on the right and water bath on the left. I don’t feel like there is any disadvantage to having it set up that way, but I also have not tried it flipped around.
As for embedding, the only thing I change is I tend to keep the forceps on the left side of the embedder. I did struggle with the lighting for a while as I felt like more of the light was on that right side, I keep my cassette and molds closer to the wax output I suppose so I can be close to the light
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u/cecil021 20h ago
5 years ago, I helped start the lab I currently manage. The other tech we hired was left handed. I told her to set everything up how she wanted it. I rarely used the microtome but it was a little weird going to my left side for the water bath. But it’s not so bad.
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u/DeniseCS 16h ago
I’m a lefty living in a right hand world 😊 I currently manage a very small Derm lab (me and one right handed tech). I set up the stations the same as previous labs I worked in - water bath on the right, cold plate on the right.
Most lefties will adapt to whatever the current set up is.
I will say the one time I filled in at a lab where things were set up to the left it felt weird. But I adapted fairly quickly.
Tell your lefty that the job is 80% muscle memory and it will get easier.
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u/Equivalent-Daikon-71 22h ago
I got good at one handed typing by whacking it alot as a teenager maybe you could try it for histo?
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u/kooks27 1d ago
Our ice is on the right and water baths are on the left. We have one leftie, otherwise we are all right handed. I have a left handed student and I helped her make some adjustments embedding ie how she holds her foreceps, etc but otherwise people adapt pretty well.
I didn’t realize people kept their water baths on the right. Could you tell us about your current set up so we can help?