Example: import pandas as pn ind = pn.MultiIndex.from_tuples([('a', 1), ('a', 2), ('b', 1), ('b',2)], names=['fist', 'second']) wp = pn.Panel(np.random.random((4,5,5)), items=ind, major_axis=np.arange(5), minor_axis=np.arange(5)) In [10]: wp['a'] ... KeyError: 'no item named a' In [11]: wp.ix['a'] ... KeyError: 'no item named a'