What are benign lesions of the liver?
Benign hepatic lesions include cystic and parenchymal lesions.
Benign lesions (precancerous lesions) that may become cancerous include:
- Atypical hyperplastic nodules of the liver
- Papillary tumors of the hepatic cholangiocytes
- Cystadenoma of the hepatic cholangiocytes
- Hepatic adenoma
- Hepatic vascular smooth muscle lipoma
Benign lesions that do not typically become cancerous include:
- Hepatic cavernous hemangioma
- Focal nodular hyperplasia of the liver
- Simple hepatic cysts
- Hepatic abscess
- Hepatic encrustation disease
- Isolated necrotic nodules of the liver
How are benign liver lesions found?
Benign hepatic lesions are most often found on physical examination and need to be seen in the context of liver disease. Ultrasound of the abdomen is usually used for screening and follow-up, tumor markers are useful for differential diagnosis, and CT/MRI plain plus enhanced scans are used to confirm the diagnosis.
If the diagnosis is not confirmed by imaging, a liver aspiration biopsy may be performed.
How are benign liver lesions treated?
The treatment of benign liver lesions should be selected based on the presence or absence of significant symptoms and the propensity for malignancy:
- Surgical resection should be performed electively if there is a predisposition for malignancy;
- For those without cancerous tendency, the indications for surgery should be strictly grasped, and surgical resection should be selected only for those with combined symptoms that significantly affect the quality of life, or those with rapid tumor growth that makes it difficult to exclude malignancy;
- For benign liver lesions that do not require treatment, abdominal ultrasonography should be reviewed once a year to observe the changes of the tumor.