Preoperative diagnosis of thyroid papillary and anaplastic carcinomas by real-time quantitative reverse transcription-polymerase chain reaction of oncofetal fibronectin messenger RNA

The restricted expression of oncofetal fibronectin (onfFN) mRNA in thyroid papillary and anaplastic carcinomas was recently reported. In this study, w e measured the copy number of onfFN mRNA in RNAs extracted from fine needle aspiration biopsies by real-time quantitative reverse transcription-PCR us ing thyroglobulin mRNA as an internal control. By measuring the onfFN:thyro globulin mRNA ratio, preoperative aspirates from 31 papillary carcinomas an d an anaplastic carcinoma can be distinguished from those from 5 adenomatou s goiters, 5 follicular adenomas, and 4 follicular carcinomas. Thus, quanti fication of onfFN by real-time quantitative reverse transcription-PCR may b e useful for the preoperative diagnosis of papillary and anaplastic carcino mas.