Pre-analytical factors, such as fixation time, influence morphology of diagnostic and predictive immunohistochemical staining, which are increasingly used in the evaluation of lung cancer. Our aim was to investigate if variations in fixation time influence the outcome of immunohistochemical staining in lung cancer. From lung resections, specimen with tumor size bigger than 4 cm, 10 samples were obtained: 2 were put through the standard fixation protocol, 5 through the delayed, and 3 through the prolonged fixation protocol. After paraffin embedding, tissue microarrays (TMAs) were made. They were stained with 20 antibodies and scored for quality and intensity of staining. Samples with delay in fixation showed loss of TMA cores on glass slides and deterioration of tissue quality leading to reduction in the expression of CK 7, Keratin MNF116, CAM 5.2, CK 5/6, TTF-1, C-MET, Napsin A, D2-40, and PD-L1. Prolonged fixation had no influence on the performance of immunohistochemical stains. Delay of fixation negatively affects the expression of different immunohistochemical markers, influencing diagnostic (cytokeratins) and predictive (PD-L1) testing. These results emphasize the need for adequate fixation of resection specimen. Electronic supplementary material The online version of this article (10.1007/s00428-019-02595-9) contains supplementary material, which is available to authorized users.

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