Talk:Biopsy

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This article was originially taken from the public domain NCI thesaurus, a huge collection of public domain definitions of medical terms.

[edit] question?

Are all bipsies done to determine if there is cancer?

  • No. I've had a sample taken from my liver to determine the state of an unrelated illness. --Kizor 13:57, 20 April 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Cancer and Biopsy in Nature Cure

This section seems out of place in a mainstream cancer article, so I've removed it. Biopsying tumors is standard procedure. To suggest otherwise would represent a fringe practice that is outside the scope of standard medical practice. This material may be more appropriate in an alternative medicine article. Andrew73 14:51, 18 August 2006 (UTC)

Depending on the suspected cancer, biopsy is contraindicated. Eg, a mass in a location characteristic of germ cell tumor plus abnormally high alpha fetoprotein: given this combination, some authorities recommend surgical complete removal without prior biopsy because biopsy is likely to involve "spillage" and the risk of consequent metastasis is too high. --Una Smith (talk) 20:04, 22 January 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Thoughts

I've started a major expansion. My approach is to try to discuss various aspects of biopsy and list a number of biopsies in each discussion to illustrate with a minimum of duplication, while "touching all the bases. Ultimately, topics that might result in lists are modality (direct detection, endoscopic, image guided), indication (screening, surveillance, diagnosis of lesion). As a number of specific biopsies have their own articles, I don't want to overduplicate. I did a lot of this from memory, so I will work on tracking down more references.Novangelis (talk) 15:41, 3 February 2008 (UTC)