EFFICACY OF FINE-NEEDLE ASPIRATION BIOPSY OF THYROID-NODULES - EXPERIENCE OF A MEXICAN INSTITUTION

In most centers only selected patients with high risk thyroid nodules undergo thyroid surgery, and fine-needle aspiration biopsy (FNA) is us ed to select patients for surgical treatment. The aim of the present s tudy was to evaluate the impact of FNA on the management of thyroid no dules at our institution. A total of 872 patients who underwent FNA ov er a period of 7 years were retrospectively analyzed. There were 66 me n and 806 women with a mean age of 49 +/- 15 years. Altogether 549 pat ients presented with a thyroid nodule and 323 with multinodular diseas e. The sensitivity and specificity of FNA were 90.0% and 99.8%, respec tively. The positive and negative predictive values mere 98% and 99%, respectively, and the accuracy was 99%. Our results are in agreement w ith those of other reports establishing that PNA of the thyroid is saf e, reliable, and effective for differentiating benign from malignant n odules.