Cancer Testing & Diagnosis

When your care team finds an area of concern while conducting a physical exam or another diagnostic test, like a colonoscopy, they may remove a small piece of tissue from the area to examine for cancer cells. This is called a biopsy.

For nonsolid samples, like a cyst or fluid-filled tumor, a fine needle may be needed to remove fluid to examine instead of a tissue sample.

Depending on the circumstances of your biopsy, you may only need local anesthesia for your procedure and you may go home the same day.

Imaging exams, or diagnostic imaging, are specialized scans of your bones, organs or blood vessels, taken by technologists and studied by our radiology leaders for signs of tumors or abnormal growths.

After taking the scans, they are shared with your multidisciplinary cancer care team to develop a treatment plan. Depending on your diagnosis, you may need continued imaging through treatment to check on tumor progression.

As part of a screening your doctor may choose to use a small, flexible tube with a camera to examine areas of concern inside your body. If your physician determines it’s necessary, they can take biopsy sample of the area to help streamline your diagnosis.

Common scopes include:

• Endoscopy
• Colonoscopy
• Laparoscopy