Correlation of Fine Needle Aspiration Cytology of Thyroid Gland with Histopathological Results

Fine needle aspiration cytology (FNAC) is considered as the gold standard diagnostic test for the diagnosis of thyroid nodules. It is a cost-effective procedure that provides specific diagnosis rapidly with minimal complications. It plays an important role in the determination of treatment- patients with suspected malignancy diagnosis can be subjected to surgery. On the other hand it can decrease the rate of unnecessary surgeries.

The aim of this study was to evaluate and compare the correlation, accuracy of fine needle aspirational cytology (FNAC) in the diagnosis of thyroid lesions with the final histopathologic diagnosis in the surgical specimens.

In our study we have performed a retrospective analysis of a case series of patients who were admitted to the Department of Endocrine, General and Oncological Surgery of Hospital of M. Kopernik in Łodź (Poland) between May 2016 and December 2017 and underwent FNAC with subsequent surgery. Cytological diagnosis was classified into six Bethesda categories.

On cytological examination 1070/1262 were reported as benign, 49 malignant and 143 suspicious. On histopathological examination, 956/1070 cases were confirmed as benign but there were 114 discordant cases. Among the other cases histopathology diagnosis of malignancy matched in 45/49 and 128/143 cases.The sensitivity and specificity were 60,28% and 98,05% respectively. False positive rate was 1.95% and false negative rate was 39.72%. The positive predictive value was 90.1% and negative predictive value was 89.35%. Accuracy of FNA in differentiating benign from malignant thyroid lesions was 89,46%.

Fine needle aspiration cytology is a simple, cost-effective and popular procedure for the diagnosis of thyroid cancer. It is recommended as the first line investigation for the diagnosis of thyroid lessions.