Cervical lymph node metastases of thyroid carcinoma - an alternative of the "lateral aberrant thyroid"

The neoplastic thyroid tissue found in the laterocervical lymph nodes of euthyroid patients is associated with an intrathyroid carcinoma identified in the subsequently operated gland, asserting its metastic origin. Eighty percent of the thyroid carcinomas present cervical metastases in a variable number of lymph nodes belonging to more than one topographic group.