• Hans-Ullrich Voelker, Laura Poetzl, Annette Strehl, Hans-Konrad Mueller-Hermelink, Ansgar Stuefe, and Gerhard Stauch.
• Pathology, Leopoldina Hospital, Gustav-Adolf-Str 8, D-97422 Schweinfurt.
• Afr Health Sci. 2020 Sep 1; 20 (3): 1313-1321.

Background/ObjectiveIn a project of telepathology (TP) between German pathologists and a hospital in Tanzania, trained technical assistants have uploaded digital histological images onto the internet-based platform ipath. The diagnoses from 486 paediatric specimens were analysed.MethodsThe investigation included diagnoses, either primarily done via TP or secondarily after a further workup of the paraffin-embedded tissue, which was sent to Germany for cases which could not be solved via TP. In the latter, the initial TP-diagnoses were compared with the results after re-evaluation.ResultsThe median age was 11 years. The cohort comprised 390 benign diseases (80.2%) and 96 malignant diseases (19.8%). For benign diseases, the most frequent anatomic sites were lymph nodes, skin, and soft tissue, breast, and head&-neck. Frequent diagnoses were non-specific inflammations and benign tumors. In malignant diseases, the most sites were lymph nodes, skin, soft tissue, head&neck, and ovary and the most frequent diseases sarcomas and lymphomas. The paraffin embedded tissue of 179 cases (36.3%) was shipped to Germany. With the concordance analysis, we could discover the mandatory necessity for the possibility of second opinion in difficult cases.ConclusionAn exclusively TP-support cannot meet all requirements of modern medical diagnostics. The education of local pathologists is imperative.© 2020 Voelker H-U et al.

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