Please provide a simple explanation of a liver biopsy. How is
it done? What conditions is it used to diagnose? Please include a few
helpful links to pages with more detailed information and, if
possible, links to some images that would be relevant to the
procedure.

Hi informationseeker-ga, 

Fortunately, today the web is filled with nice clear explanatory
information about most medical procedures. Gone are the days when we
had to pour over heavy medical tomes and arcane jargon to try to
understand what doctors are doing to our bodies. Now we just look up
the words online and we are handed simple illustrations and clear
explanations.

To fully answer your question, let’s start with the basics –

=======================================
WHAT IS A BIOPSY?
=======================================

A biopsy is a procedure by which the doctor takes a small piece of one
of your body’s organs in order to run tests on it.  Rather than open
you up and “cut” a piece off your organ (which would be unnecessary
and too invasive) they use a special needle that they can insert into
your organ and then draw out a very small amount of tissue. The doctor
then examines the tissue under a microscope


========================================
WHY WOULD THEY DO A LIVER BIOPSY?
========================================


A doctor would want to do a liver biopsy if your blood tests show that
your liver is not functioning properly.  They might also do one if
x-rays showed that your liver was enlarged.


========================================
WHAT ARE THEY LOOKING FOR?
========================================


A biopsy can help a doctor determine the amount of damage to your
liver and the severity of any liver disease you might have. An
abnormal result may reveal liver diseases such as cirrhosis,
hepatitis, or infections such as tuberculosis. It may also indicate
cancer.

This website includes a list of liver ailments that indicate the need
for a liver biopsy:

MEDLINE – LIVER BIOPSY
http://www.nlm.nih.gov/medlineplus/ency/article/003895.htm

(for the list, click on “What abnormal results mean”) 


==========================================
WHAT WILL THEY DO DURING THE BIOPSY?
==========================================


The biopsy procedure is considered minor surgery and is done in the
hospital. This website explains the entire thing in simple terms
step-by-step, so rather than repeat it here; I’ll just point you to
the site ---


NATIONAL DIGESTIVE DISEASES INFORMATION CLEARINGHOUSE
Liver biopsy
http://www.niddk.nih.gov/health/digest/pubs/liverbiopsy/liverbiopsy.htm


======================================
FURTHER READING
=======================================

JACKSON GASTROENTEROLOGY
Liver biopsy
http://www.gicare.com/pated/epdlv27.htm


MEDLINE IMAGES – LIVER BIOPSY
http://www.nlm.nih.gov/medlineplus/ency/imagepage/1102.htm


WHAT IS A LIVER BIOPSY?
http://hepatitis-c.de/biopsy.htm


ALA E. IMAM, MD - LIVER BIOPSY
http://www.imam-md.com/liver.html


HEALTH CENTRAL – LIVER BIOPSY – ILLUSTRATION
http://www.healthcentral.com/mhc/img/img1102.cfm


So that should answer all of your questions. If anything I’ve said
isn’t clear, please feel free to ask for clarification.

--K~

SEARCH STRATEGY:

My only search term was: “LIVER BIOPSY” and I got many, many results.
For you I chose those that were written in plain language that would
be easiest to understand. If you’d like to read more, here are my
search results:

GOOGLE SEARCH RESULTS – “LIVER BIOPSY”
://www.google.com/search?q=%22liver+biopsy%22&hl=en&lr=&ie=ISO-8859-1

If you’d like to see more images, here is the result of my image
search:

GOOGLE IMAGE SEARCH RESULTS – “LIVER BIOPSY”
http://images.google.com/images?q=%22liver+biopsy%22&svnum=10&hl=en&lr=&ie=UTF-8&start=0&sa=N

This researcher gave a very good answer in a very short time.