EASL Clinical Practice Guidelines on the management of benign liver tumours.

Benign liver tumours are a heterogeneous group of lesions with different cellular origins, as summarized by an international panel of experts sponsored by the World Congress of Gastroenterology in 1994 [1]. These lesions are frequently found incidentally as a consequence of the widespread use of imaging tests and often have a benign course. Some of these lesions are of greater clinical relevance than others, and the aim of these recommendations is to provide a contemporary aid for the practical diagnosis and management of the more common benign tumours. These include haemangiomas, focal nodular hyperplasia (FNH) and hepatocellular adenoma (HCA). The evidence and recommendations in these guidelines have been graded according to the grading of the recommendations assessment development and evaluation (GRADE) system [2]. The strength of recommendations reflects the quality of underlying evidence. The GRADE system offers two grades of recommendation: strong (1) or weak (2) (Table 1). The clinical practice guidelines thus consider the quality of evidence: the higher the quality of evidence, the more likely a strong recommendation is warranted; the greater the variability in values and preferences, or the greater the uncertainty, the more likely a weaker recommendation is warranted.