Liver biopsy - what to expect

Annie62 · July 2012

The past few months I've been undergoing various tests. I had severe shoulder and neck pain, as well as digestion issues (lost 15 lbs in 5 months without trying) and a chronic cough/trouble breathing. Sounds terrible, right? Well the arm/shoulder/neck pain is gone after 3-4 months, the digestion issues finally abated after 5 months. Cough still with me, but chest x-rays, CT scans show nothing. Docs think I had sever allergies that turned into asthma.

But the CT scans/MRI's I've had showed a spot of concern on my T-11 vertebra and some new spots on my liver - mostly small but one that showed up as a centimer. Bloodwork is fine. The MRI I just had on my liver could not conclusively say cancer, so now I'm going for a biopsy. Onc said that a spinal biopsy is more difficult so the liver it is.

Will I miss any work? Does it hurt? Any input appreciated.

Thanks,

Annie

Lauriesh · July 2012

People's experiences seem to vary.

Mine was very easy. Very little pain. You shouldn't need to take any time off of work, except the afternoon when you have it done. They usually have you lay still for an hour or so afterward to reduce the risk of bleeding.

Laurie

hopeforlife · July 2012

Hi Annie,

I have seen and done many liver biopsies myself. It is a painless procedure lasting about 15 minutes or so. I guess the only pain you will feel will be when they inject lidocaine (local anesthetic) around the area that IR will puncture in order to gain access to your liver. Liver does not carry any pain fibers so once the needle goes through your skin, you absolutely don't feel any pain. They will take mutiple CT pictures of your liver to make sure they are in the right spot. I wish you tons of luck for your procedure and I am sure that if your liver enzymes are normal like you said above, the lesions in your liver will turn out to be benign.

Annie62 · July 2012

Thanks for the replies ladies. Very helpful!

Liver biopsy - what to expect

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