Accuracy of Fine Needle Aspiration Cytology as primitive diagnostic tool in local population of Pakistan

Abstract

ABSTRACT
 Objective: To determine the diagnostic accuracy of FNAC in the diagnosis of thyroid neoplasm among patients with thyroid swelling in local population of Pakistan.
 Method: It was a retrospective study conducted in ENT and endocrinological department of JPMC Karachi and Khuzdar district between 1st august 2018 to 20th march 2019. The current study was performed to collect data for last five years patients in ENT and endocrinological departments. FNAC in all these patients was performed either by residents or consultants without local anaesthesia, using a 23-gauge needle. Smears were immediately fixed with 95% ethyl alcohol solution, and staining was performed using Papanicolaou, Hemacolour, and Haematoxylin and Eosin (H and E) stain. The results were classified into four groups: inadequate, benign, suspicious, and malignant.
 A proforma was used for data collection, including registration number, age, gender, FNAC opinion , FNAC category , biopsy number and histology opinion. Sensitivity, specificity, positive predictive value (PPV), negative predictive value (NPV) and diagnostic accuracy of FNAC were calculated using the standard formulae
 Results: The overall evaluation of FNAC technique as primitive tool reflected the accuracy of te method up to 87.7%, sensitivity 87.5% and specificity of 88% in local population of Pakistan. The presented study showed the safe use of FNAC with low rate of false negative results and few complicated cases.
 Conclusion: FNAC helped to reduce the unnecessary surgery in the subjects with benign lesions and to produce better follow up investigations, therefore, improve the quality of life of the patients with thyroid lesions.