Muscle and nerve biopsies Current aspects

Muscle and nerve biopsies are important instruments in the diagnostic of neuromuscular diseases. The histological, immunohistochemical, electron microscopical and molecular pathological methods for these biopsies have made major advances during the last decades. Similar progress has been made in refining the clinical, electrophysiological, biochemical and molecular genetic methods applied. These developments have led to marked improvements in the diagnosis of neuromuscular diseases. Muscle and nerve biopsies are invasive, non-curative, purely diagnostic procedures. Therefore, their indication has to be discussed thoroughly in the special context of each individual case; biopsies should be performed and processed only by physicians and other technicians well-experienced in the complex procedures necessary to reach the optimal level of diagnostic information.