Liver Histopathology (HIS) 

Laboratory Overview

Normal opening hours are 9am to 5pm Monday to Friday. 

The laboratory also provides a rapid same day diagnostic service for small biopsies and a 24/7 service for NHSBT donor frozen section assessment, which can be arranged via air call to the on call KCH liver transplant co-ordinator.

Liver Histopathology is a UKAS accredited medical laboratory (No: 8805) accredited to ISO15189:2022 for the tests listed in the schedule of accreditation on the UKAS website (https://www.ukas.com/wp-content/uploads/schedule_uploads/00007/8805-Medi...)

The department handles approximately 4500 specimens annually including liver biopsies, liver and pancreato-biliary resection specimens, pancreato-biliary cytology and referrals for expert liver pathology opinion from other centres nationally and internationally. There is also an active postgraduate pathology teaching programme supporting UK and international visiting pathologists.

The service runs a biennial paediatric liver pathology conference in conjunction with the paediatric liver clinical services at KCH.

Key Features

 Liver Histopathology provides the following services

• Histological examination of adult and paediatric medical, tumour and allograft liver biopsy specimens and of surgical hepatobiliary and pancreatic tumour and non-tumour specimens, in particular, those arisen from liver transplantation and hepato-pancreato-biliary surgical services; brush cytology (biliary tree) and fine-needle aspiration (pancreas).
• Wide range of special staining techniques.
• Specialist immunohistochemical and electron microscopic investigations.
• Selected in situ hybridisation (EBER)
• Intra-operative and donor assessment frozen sections (available 24/7).
• Expert clinical and technical advice.
• Second opinion on complex referred adult and paediatric liver and pancreatic cases.
• Reporting of liver biopsies for other UK and international hospitals under contract
• Participation at cancer MDMs for HPB cancers, hepatocellular carcinomas and neuroendocrine neoplasms.
• Running of adult and paediatric liver and paediatric gastrointestinal pathology histology meetings
• Photography of specimens
• Research services to KHP and external researchers including novel test development and biobanking

 Clinical Team overview

The department comprises 3 Whole time equivalent Consultant Histopathologists together with a team of Biomedical Scientists.  The service provides pathology support for the King’s College Hospital adult and paediatric liver services including transplantation, the adult and paediatric regional Hepato-pancreato-biliary surgical service and for the paediatric gastrointestinal surgical and endoscopic services, including transplantation.   Under contract basis, the service provides liver biopsy reporting for 18 international and national Hospitals.

Request Form

The Liver Histopathology request form is below. Please complete the request form as fully as possible

User Handbook 

A copy of the department's User Handbook is available below