Authors: Kunwar S S Bhatia Cina S L Tong Carmen C M Cho Edmund H Y Yuen Yolanda Y P Lee Anil T Ahuja
Publish Date: 2012/05/30
Volume: 22, Issue: 11, Pages: 2397-2406
Abstract
Seventyfour patients with 81 focal thyroid lesions undergoing conventional US with needle cytology also underwent SWE Absolute and relative SWE stiffness measurements on colourcoded elastograms were correlated with cytology and their discriminatory performances assessedSeventeen nodules were malignant 13 papillary 4 other cancers 45 benign 43 hyperplastic nodules 2 focal thyroiditis 5 indeterminate “follicular lesions” and 5 had inadequate cytology SWE results were higher in malignant than benign nodules P values 002–005 although their discriminatory performances were mediocre AUCs 058–074 The most accurate SWE cutoff 345 kPa for a 2mm region of interest achieved 769 sensitivity and 711 specificity for discriminating papillary cancer from benign nodules No thresholds produced high sensitivity without lowering specificity appreciably and vice versa Nodule size correlated with SWE for benign nodules P 001 Intranodular cystic change or calcification did not influence SWE Qualitatively elastographic artefacts and foci lacking colour elasticity signal occurred in some solid nodules
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