Assessing the risk of false-negative fine-needle aspiration cytology and of incidental cancer in nodular goiter.

Objective: In cases of multinodular goiter with negative cytologic result, reasonable management options include surgical treatment, simple follow-up, or more recently introduced conservative therapies such as laser or radiofrequency ablation, and recombinant human thyroid-stimulating hormone-augmented radioiodine. For patients who are eligible for follow-up or nonsurgical treatments. The possibility that they may have an undiagnosed malignancy (false-negative [FN]-fine-needle aspiration cytology [FNAC] result or incidental thyroid cancer [ITC]) should be considered. The aim of our study was to asses. The risk of malignancy in patients known to have presumably benign thyroid disease.Methods: Surgical series of patients who underwent total thyroidectomy for benign disease between 2000 and 2010 at two Italian centers were reviewed. Patients with any preoperative suspicion of malignancy were excluded.Results: Histologic examination revealed that 84 of 970 (8.6%) thyroidectomized patients had malignancy (5% ITC and 3.6% FN-FNAC), with 89.8% of ITCs having a diameter <10 mm, and 65.7% of FN-FNAC cancers having a diameter >30 mm. Sixty-seven thyroid malignancy patients (79.8%) had stage I disease (American Joint Committee on Cancer criteria). The risk of FN-FNAC increases with increasing size o. The nodule, whil. The risk of ITC increases as nodule size decreases.Conclusion: The risk of malignancy in presumably benign thyroid disease cannot be overlooked, but can be minimized through skillfully performed ultrasonography (US) examination and FNAC. Once a patient with multinodular goiter is referred for follow-up or nonsurgical therapy, careful US surveillance is mandatory.