Endocrine Abstracts

Introduction: Several recent studies have reported an increase in the incidence of thyroid cancer during the last decades. The delineation between low-risk and high-risk tumor size is not well defined. The purpose of this study was to evaluate the relationship between the primary tumor size of differentiated thyroid cancer and clinicopathologic data.

Methods: We have analysed all records of all patients submitted to thyroidectomy at our hospital between 2005 and 2010, with the histologic result of differentiated thyroid cancer. Were studied 64 case reports considered and considered medical data such as age, gender, tumor size, solitary/multiple nodularity, presence/absence of chronic thyroiditis, of compressive symptoms and of microcalcifications, cytological, histologic and neoplasic stage classification.

Results: The studied population (58 females, 8 males) was characterized by a mean age of 49.2±15.9 years old. Mean tumor size was 2.7±1.3 cm; it was significantly associated with the presence of compressive symptoms (P=0.011). Solitary tumoral nodules were significantly larger than neoplasic nodules associated with multinodules (P=0.037). In addition, the tumor size was significantly smaller in patients with previous malignant cytological result (P=0.002). There was a significant association between tumor size and the neoplasic stage of the disease (P=0.014).

Conclusion: Lesion size of differentiated thyroid cancer influences the occurrence of compressive symptoms. Tumor size of differentiated thyroid cancer is greater in solitary nodules, in patients with previous non malignant cytological result, and in more aggressive stages of the disease.