Correlation between preoperative diagnostic tests and postoperative histopathologic findings in patiens with thyroid nodules

Thyroid nodules are common around the world as well as in our country. The vast majority of the thyroid nodules are benign and less than 5% of clinically apperant nodules are malignant. Although the risk of malignancy in a thyroid nodule is low, early detection of the thyroid cancer may improve survival rates. Management of thyroid nodules includes thyroid function tests, ultrasound, thyroid scintigraphy and fine needle aspiration (FNA). FNA is commonly used for diagnosis of thyroid nodules. It yields more accurate results when combined with other tests. The study design involved reviewing medical records of the patients with thyroid nodule who had undergone thyroidectomy in Department of Otorhinolaryngology Gaziantep University Faculty of Medicine between 2012 and 2014. The collected data included the physical examination findings, blood tests, ultrasonographic findings and results of FNA. The correlation between physical examination findings, blood tests and ultrasonographic findings and FNA results of the patients and postoperative histopathologic findings were investigated. The sensitivity and specifity of these diagnostic tests for differentiating benign nodules from malignant nodules were calculated. We found a significant association between the nodule size and the malignancy rate (p=0.034). Malignancy significantly decreased with increasing nodule size. There was a significant association between the nodule size detected by ultrasound (p=0.019).Malignancy significantly decreased with increasing nodule size. We found a significant association between FNA results and final histopathologic examination (p=0.001). According to our results, the sensitivity and specifity of FNA for thyroid nodules were 25.4% and 82.8%, respectively. The sensitiviy of FNA calculated in our study was lower than reported in the literature. We concluded that FNA should be combined with other tests for accurate diagnosis of thyroid nodules.