What is the purpose of a ct guided biopsy?

Answer 1

First of all we should define what is a biopsy. It is derived from the root words "bio" (life) and "opsis" (sight), referring essentially to the evaluation of living tissue.

A biopsy is an essential tool in the evaluation of disease conditions and helping to determine the characteristics of tissue changes. There are many different ways to obtain biopsy samples and they vary depending upon where the area to be biopsied is located.

A biopsy may be as simple as taking a needle and syringe, using the needle to puncture a superficial growth, swelling, abnormality which is easily visualized (so it can be seen that the needle is actually within the area of interest) and withdrawing a sample. This is referred to as a needle aspirate. The sample can then be placed on a slide and evaluated under the microscope, which is termed cytology, from "cyto" (cell) and "ology" (study of). To aid in the visualization of elements of the sample, special stains are usually applied.

However, there are times when the area/lesion that needs to be biopsied is not easily visualized and may be inside the body or part of an internal organ. Trying to take a needle biopsy sample without knowing where the needle is going is extremely dangerous as internal organs, structures, or major blood vessels could be punctured leading to severe complications. In addition, there is no guarantee that the area of interest was even sampled as the placement of the biopsy needle was not seen!

The use of the CT or other imaging techniques (such as ultrasound) expedite the procedure so it is safely and accurately accomplished. Using imaging, in addition to special biopsy instruments, the progress of the needle can be followed and guided to the exact location where the sampling needs to be done. Once obtained, cytology may be done, but most often the sample will be sent out for histopathologic analysis; "histo" (tissue), "path" (hurt), "ology" (study of). Histopathology is a very effective and sensitive means of evaluating tissue abnormalities. The samples are sent to a pathologist who then has various means of preparing and evaluating the samples in order to provide an accurate diagnosis.

Answer 2

Computed tomography (CT) is a process that images anatomic information from a cross-sectional plane of the body.