Percutaneous Image-guided Biopsy in an Elderly Population

Purpose: To evaluate the safety, accuracy, and clinical use of image-guided biopsy results in an elderly (age ≥80 years) patient population. Materials and Methods: Image-guided biopsy results of 722 elderly patients were obtained from our image-guided biopsy database over a 5-year period. This retrospective study of the data yielded 616 cases. The accuracy and complication rates for the elderly population were compared with the remaining patients in the database who were younger than 80 years of age (n= 13,012). In addition, use of biopsy results for treatment was also evaluated against a group of randomly selected younger patients who were matched for type and location of biopsy. Results: Image-guided biopsy in both patient groups was characterized by a high accuracy rate (95% for the elderly patients vs 96.5% for others), but the accuracy rate was significantly higher in the nonelderly group (P = .0247). Image-guided biopsy in elderly patients did not carry a greater complication rate compared with younger patients for any major complication. Use of malignant biopsy results (ie, initiating any therapy) was significantly less common in elderly patients (58% underwent therapy) than in younger age groups. In patients aged 60-70 y, 100% initiated therapy; in patients aged 70-80 y, 95% underwent therapy. Conclusions: Image-guided biopsy in elderly patients is a safe and accurate procedure. There is no greater risk of complication in elderly patients. Malignant diagnoses achieved by image-guided biopsy in elderly patients resulted less frequently in the initiation of therapy for malignancy.