Diagnosis of thyroid cancer in southwestern Greece

A prospective study of 1,200 patients with thyroid disease was performed from 1983 to 1988 to appraise the reliability of various diagnostic techniques in patients with thyroid cancer. Histologic confirmation was obtained in 201 patients. By assuming that only solid lesions, single or multiple, represented malignancy, the sensitivity and specificity of ultrasonography was 4.64 and 52.2%, respectively. Findings of fine needle aspiration (FNA) cytology and of carcinoembryonic antigen (CEA) serum concentration were also evaluated. The sensitivity and specificity of these two methods (91.2% and 84.1% for FNA and 89.7% and 81.3% for CEA, respectively) were found to be high enough to permit surgical intervention after a diagnosis of malignancy was made. It appears that the combination of FNA cytology and CEA serum measurement represents the most accurate method for the pre-operative detection of thyroid cancer.