Biopsy

Biopsy refers to taking a sample of any body tissues, or removing a small piece for laboratory examination. The size of the sample could vary and be very small, as in fine needle aspiration (used for tumors of thyroid gland, breast, lung, liver, etc.) or it can be bigger as in surgical biopsy. All organ in the body is amenable to be biopsied.

Biopsies could be taken by way of endoscopy. This is most commonly done for cancers of

• Esophagus

• Stomach

• Colon and rectum

• Lung

• etc.

Confirmation of the diagnosis of a cancer is done by a pathologist, who will study the biopsy samples under microscope.