Diagnostic value of pancreatic biopsy

This review emphasizes that the value of pancreatic biopsy is unquestionable for the preoperative and peroperative diagnosis of pancreatic carcinoma. Improvement of biopsy methods will further increase the importance of the preoperative pancreatic biopsy. However, the considerable technical difficulties and the time expenditure associated with these methods do not allow the use of pancreatic biopsy or one of the other diagnostic procedures as a screening procedure for detecting pancreatic carcinoma before it has led to subjective symptoms such as biliary obstruction. We should concentrate on the development of an immunological test for identifying the asymptomatic patients. Some progress on this area has been initiated by an attempt to characterize a pancreas-specific oncofetal antigen (Hobbs, 1976). The early demonstration of such an antigen in serum and pancreatic fluid would substantially improve the otherwise unfavourable diagnosis of pancreatic carcinoma. Therefore, we hope that the pessimism regarding the diagnosis and prognosis of pancreatic cancer will be replaced by realistic optimism in the future.