Stephen R Schoening (asker) Apr 15, 2010:

Thanks to all Thanks. Marga, Lirka and Heart. This was a hard one, and I used your suggestions and made my final translation somewhat ambiguous but with a translator's note.
Stephen

Marga Shaw Apr 8, 2010:

To all Thanks Stephen for providing more context. However, unfortunately it did not help to do away with my concerns. Similarly to Heart I saw that the aborted material was microscopically examined. This would normally mean that the material is embedded and slices obtained which after staining are examined under a microscope. Your sample sentence/heading "Vollständige Einbettung" could just mean this.
But on reading your first sample sentence again ("Erst bei vollständiger Einbettung herdförmig Anteile ...") I am not so sure, and I still tend to stick to my first hunch, i.e. "only when nidation/implantation/nesting in is completed... " as being possibly referred to here. This would also be in agreement with lirka. I will once more think about this.

Lirka Apr 8, 2010:

Given more context, it is clear that they're referring to completed 'implantation' not microscopic embedding.
Meaning that miscarriage happened at a stage of completed implantation; now they're analyzing this aborted 'material'.

Stephen R Schoening (asker) Apr 8, 2010:

More details from asker Thanks Marga and Lirka for your input so far.

Marga, you asked for the part before and so I'll give the preceding sentence and the one before that: "Sezernierendes Corpusendometrium und Deziduabestandteile, z.T. regressiv verändert mit leukozytär und hämorrhagisch dursetzten Nekrosen."

The sentence before this one discusses the "Abortmaterial" and says "Vollständige Einbettung."

The sentence after the one I asked starts another section and probably wouldn't help.
Hope it helps you. It does seem to relate to the following sentence.
Stephen

Holly Hart Apr 8, 2010:

Context could change the meaning - Since this is microscopy and it is unclear how the sample was prepared, 'Einbettung' could mean 'embedding' as some samples are prepared this way and then thinly sliced and cross-section viewed under the microscope.
And I do agree with Marga that this sort of abbreviated form of writing is often found in medical records of this sort. Since they do this in English as well, I often make the English reflect the German in terms of grammar... or lack of it.

Marga Shaw Apr 8, 2010:

@ Stephen The German sentence would benefit from a verb, e.g. "Erst bei vollständiger Einbettung sind herdförmig Anteile ... vorhanden." Medical reports are often recounted in a somewhat abbreviated fashion. However, have you got any more context, e.g. a sentence before and/or after this one please? I take it that by "Erst bei vollständiger Einbettung" means "Only when nidation/implantation/nesting in is completed"? Would you be able to confirm or negate this please?