Fine-needle aspiration biopsy for thyroid nodules: a clinical and pathological study of 782 patients / 中华全科医师杂志

ABSTRACT

Objective To evaluate clinical application of thyroid fine-needle aspiration biopsy (FNAB) and its diagnostic value.Methods FNAB was performed for 782 cases during 2005-2009 at China-Japan Friendship Hospital,Beijing and their clinical pathological data were retrospectively analyzed.Cytopathological diagnoses by FNAB were classified as unsatisfactory,benign,atypical cellular lesions,follicular neoplasm,suspicious malignancy and definite malignancy.Results of thyroid cytological and histological examinations of 76 patients with subsequent thyroidectomies were compared to those with FNAB to evaluate its diagnostic accuracy.Results Of 782 FNAB specimens,74.4 % (582/782) were classified as benign,2.6 % (20/782) as malignant,5.6 % (44/782) as follicular neoplasm,3.2 % (25/782) as atypical cellular lesion,2.9% (23/782) as suspicious malignancy and 11.3 % (88/782) as unsatisfactory.Among 76 patients with thyroidectomies,65.8 % of them (50/76) were histologically diagnosed as benign lesion,28.9 % (22/76) as definite malignancy and only 5.3 % (4/76) as benign follicular adenoma.Agreement between FNAB cytological diagnoses and histologically confirmed diagnoses for benign lesion and malignancy was 16/16 and 16/17,respectively.Conclusion FNAB is a reliable diagnostic method for evaluation of thyroid nodules.