Thyroid volume of East Slovakian adolescents determined by ultrasound 40 years after the introduction of iodized salt.

Abstract

Thyroid volume was examined by ultrasonography in 207 boys and 220 girls aged 15-16 years from East Slovakia and it was found that 49.3% of the boys and 52.3% of the girls had thyroids between 10 and 15 ml. These thyroid volumes resemble those found in school children from areas of mild iodine deficiency (e.g. FRG) and are twice as large as those reported from Sweden, where iodine intake is sufficient. The findings were compared to these reported by others in 1949-53 before the introduction of iodine prophylaxis. It may be concluded that 40 years of goiter prophylaxis with iodized salt, though resulting in urinary excretion of approximately 100 micrograms/24 hr (as found by others in 1984), abolished large and medium size goiters in adolescents and decreased a prevalence of goiter grade I to about 25 percent, but appeared still to be insufficient to prevent goiter grade I completely.