CT Biopsy

CT guidance for your biopsy

We offer CT biopsies at Newton-Wellesley Hospital, which are procedures that use an X-ray to take images of a select part of your body that’s determined by your doctor in coordination with a board-certified radiologist, who also collects tissue samples from the area.

How Do I Prepare for the Exam?

To prepare for a CT biopsy, don’t consume any food or liquid for six hours before your appointment time. Specific lab tests, as defined by one of our radiologists and/or your doctor, must be obtained prior to your procedure.

Please arrive at the Radiology/Laboratory reception area two hours before your procedure, and make travel arrangements for after your procedure, as we don’t allow you to drive yourself home.

If there is any possibility that you are pregnant or nursing a baby, please speak with your referring doctor before your appointment.

What Happens During the Exam?

Prior to your CT biopsy, a registered nurse will bring you back to an exam room, where he/she will describe the procedure to you (specific for each patient depending on area to be biopsied). The radiologist who performs the procedure then will meet with you to assess you and answer any of your questions.

In the exam room, you will lie on the table either on your stomach, with your arms raised over your head, or on your back with your arms raised over your head. We expose the biopsied area and place a large positioning grid on your skin to help the radiologist mark a spot for a needle to be placed.

Once the area is marked, the table will rise up and move in and out of the scanner, and several scans will be taken. Then the needle is placed and the biopsy begins. Scans of the area are taken as the procedure continues, allowing for the needles to continuously be properly placed as the doctors assesses the surrounding tissue.

Depending on the area to be biopsied, the procedure typically takes about one hour. Ultimately, a specimen is taken and sent to the lab for testing and results are sent to your doctor.

What Happens After the Exam?

After the exam, a technologist will process your images using a computer, and the nursing staff will bring you to an exam room for observation. A radiologist will evaluate the images within 24 hours and dictate a report, which is transcribed and sent to your doctor.

Department of Radiology, Newton Wellesley Hospital
2014 Washington Street
Newton, MA 02462
Phone: 617-243-6600

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