Pathological diagnosis of bone sarcoma.

The diagnosis of bone lesions should be established in every case by combined clinical, radiologic and pathologic investigations. For pathologic investigation, a surgical biopsy or needle biopsy should be carried out. Before attempting to make a diagnosis, the pathologist must determine that the tissue to be studied is representative. If clinical and radiologic information is not readily available, the pathologist must insist on its submission before rendering a diagnosis on a slide. It is said that to merely "read slides" without full comprehension of the clinical setting and the radiologic clues of the biologic behavior of the tumor can easily lead to an erroneous diagnosis. A specimen from aspiration biopsy is generally adequate for immediate diagnosis for some bone tumors, but in many cases it is not sufficient for accurate classification of either benign or malignant tumors.