Best tools

The best tool your doctor has at his or her disposal is the open pleural biopsy, a procedure he or she can perform during thoracoscopy. This procedure lets him or her see directly inside your chest to determine if the cancer has spread or has affected any other organs.

Somewhat less reliable is the CT guided pleural biopsy in which your doctor can see shapes but not actual tumors. Besides looking for malignant signs in masses, your pathologist may use a number of histochemical and immunohistochemical stains (chemical analysis of a tissue sample) to confirm whether or not the disease is mesothelioma. As of today, there are still no tests to tell exactly how the disease will progress.