Percutaneous Biopsy of Soft Tissues and Muscular Lesions

Abstract

The twentieth century has seen the development of many medical techniques, including the closed biopsy. Prior to this development, a biopsy was a major undertaking, requiring general or local anesthesia and hospitalization. Thanks to the remarkable advances in musculoskeletal imaging, particularly ultrasound, computed tomography (CT) and magnetic resonance (MR) imaging, the open biopsy has been largely replaced by the imaging-guided biopsy. Although there are still indications for open biopsy, whether incisional or excisional, these now comprise a relatively small percentage of all biopsies performed. Moreover, because of the pathognomonic imaging characteristics of certain tumors, the overall need to perform any sort of biopsy, for the sole purpose of diagnosis, has been greatly reduced. Thus, it is with these recently acquired tools that the imager approaches the soft tissue mass, determining fi rst if the lesion requires biopsy for diagnosis and, if so, which modality is most appropriate.