AIM: To combine ultrasound-guided fine-needle aspiration (US-FNA) and Liu (Riu) stain to make a quick study on liver tumor lesions.METHODS: Two hundred and twenty-eight aspirations from 232 patients were completely studied. The operator himself made the quick cytodiagnosis of US-FNA smear stained by Liu method within thirty minutes. The US-FNA specimen was also sent to the pathological department for cytological study and cellblock histology. The result of our Liu-stain quick cytodiagnosis in each patient was confirmed by the final cytopathological diagnosis from pathological report.RESULTS: Among 228 samples, the quick cytodiagnosis revealed 146 malignancies, 81 benign lesions and one inadequate specimen. Cytopathological diagnosis from the pathological department revealed 150 malignancies,and 78 benign lesions. Four well-differentiated hepatocellular carcinomas (HCCs) were under-diagnosed by quick cytodiagnosis as benign and 3 benign lesions were over-diagnosed as well-differentiated HCCs. Compared with cytopathological diagnosis, quick cytodiagnosis correctly diagnosed 143 malignancies and 77 benign lesions. Except for the one inadequate specimen in quick cytodiagnosis, the accuracy of quick cytodiagnosis was 96.9% (220/227), and its sensitivity, specificity and positive and negative predictive values were 97.9%, 95.1%,97.3% and 96.3%, respectively.CONCLUSION: Liu-stain quick cytodiagnosis is a fast,convenient, safe and effective method for hepatologists in clinic practice to diagnose liver tumor. In few cases of well-differentiated HCC, Liu-stain quick cytodiagnosis has its limitation.