There’s many additional procedures which are used to help diagnose mesothelioma, and we will outline some of them in this article. Oftentimes, surgery is used to diagnose mesothelioma as sometimes fluid analyzing isn’t sufficient.  In thoracoscopy, tissue biopsies are done and the pleural cavity is evaluated in order to diagnose.  With this method, 98% of the time a proper diagnosis is able to be made.  Sometimes during the procedure the surgeon will attempt to remove some of the fluid accumulation in the intrapleural space. This method can only be performed in patients whose tumors haven’t invaded the whole pleural space.

That’s the summary of the thoracoscopy procedure of diagnosis.  This is a method which is also somewhat lower in invasiveness than methods such as a biopsy.