Needle biopsy techniques.

With the ability to perform good diagnostic mammography, breast ultrasound, ductography, cyst aspiration, abscess drainage, and stereotactic or ultrasound-guided percutaneous biopsy, the modern breast radiologist should play the central role in breast diagnosis. The definitive diagnoses afforded by percutaneous breast biopsy that obviate surgery entirely in benign lesions and streamline the therapeutic surgery for malignant lesions now can be obtained routinely. The future holds even more exciting challenges for the radiologist as percutaneous lumpectomy becomes a reality. Thus the breast radiologist, armed with the technology and techniques of the twenty-first century, truly stands on the threshold of a new era.