Validating the 2022 WHO classification in thyroid carcinomas: Prospective evidence for predicting iodine resistance

To validate whether the 2022 WHO classification improves the prediction of radioactive iodine refractory (RAIR) disease in advanced-stage thyroid carcinomas and to identify associated histological predictive factors.

A prospective cohort of 253 patients with pT3, pT4, or M1 thyroid carcinomas (TNM 2010), who underwent surgery between 2009 and 2018 and received at least one radioactive iodine dose, was analysed. Histological slides were reviewed using the 2022 WHO criteria, and clinical data were collected. Cox survival analyses and ROC curve evaluations were performed to identify factors associated with RAIR progression and assess the predictive performance of the new classification. Reclassification identified 28 low-risk neoplasms, all with favourable outcomes. Among the remaining 225 malignant cases, 155 were well-differentiated carcinomas (including 146 papillary carcinomas, 56 of which were aggressive subtypes) and 70 were high-grade carcinomas (39 high-grade differentiated and 31 poorly differentiated carcinomas). Forty patients (17.7%) developed RAIR disease. The 2022 WHO classification showed superior predictive performance compared with the 2004 WHO (AUC: 0.81 versus 0.60, P < 0.001). Multivariate analysis identified tumour necrosis as independent predictive factor of RAIR disease, regardless of the mitotic index.

The 2022 WHO classification improves RAIR disease prediction, notably by recognizing high-grade carcinomas as a distinct entity. High-grade factors, especially tumour necrosis, which emerges as a key predictive factor, should be systematically reported in thyroid carcinoma pathology reports to enhance patient management and follow-up.