Prostate

Most biopsies are performed for an elevated prostate-specific antigen (PSA) level, a palpable nodule, or a history of an abnormal biopsy. In the prostate, you are generally looking only for adenocarcinoma; there are very few nonneoplastic conditions to look for.

A typical sextant biopsy is six cores from left apex, mid, and base and right apex, mid, and base. Increasingly, urology centers are sampling additional areas, 12 or more. Laboratories differ in how many cores are placed on a single slide; some laboratories may have only two slides, left and right, with a handful of cores on each slide. It is important to preserve as much detail as the urologist or laboratory gives you and to localize the cancer as much as possible.