Ultrasonic Guidance for Renal Biopsy

To the Editor.—  The editorial endorsement of a respected journal for a particular procedure or technique should imply that that procedure or technique does have a decided advantage over other methods, and would be expected to exert a considerable influence on future practice standards regarding the procedure so endorsed. While it may well be true that ultrasonic guidance for renal biopsy will prove to be the best and safest method, most nephrologists with extensive experience in percutaneous biopsy would be quite concerned with a major bleeding complication rate of 5%, and with a nephrectomy rate of two in 76 biopsies performed on 71 patients. While such complications can occur under the best of hands, using any technique, I believe there are many series using other techniques showing significantly lower serious complication rates.I do not feel that the recent article in the Archives by Mailloux et al (138:438, 1978) merits such