Table 1.
Demographic, operative and histological data for the entire cohort
| No. of patients (n=3233) * | Benign MNG ‡ | Thyroid cancer § | P # | ||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Age (years) † | 56.4(12.5) | 56.8(12.5) | 55.4(12.7) | 0.002** | |
| Sex | 0.030 | ||||
| F | 2788 (86.2) | 87.1 | 84.3 | ||
| M | 445 (13.8) | 12.9 | 15.7 | ||
| Smoking | 632 (19.5) | 19.6 | 19.4 | 0.881 | |
| Duration of disease (months) † | 106.2(116.7) | 114.2(121.3) | 90.5(105.4) | <0.001** | |
| Positive family history of thyroid cancer | 33 (1.0) | 1.0 | 1.0 | 0.859 | |
| History of head and neck irradiation ¶ | 9 (0.3) | 0.2 | 0.4 | 0.412 | |
| Substernal MNG | 124 (3.8) | 4.2 | 3.0 | 0.100 | |
| Functional thyroid status | <0.001 | ||||
| Hypothyroidism | 89 (2.8) | 2.4 | 3.6 | ||
| Euthyroidism | 2360 (73.0) | 70.0 | 79.3 | ||
| Hyperthyroidism | 784 (24.2) | 27.6 | 17.1 | ||
| Surgical operation | 0.432 | ||||
| Total or near-total thyroidectomy | 2843 (87.9) | 87.6 | 88.6 | ||
| Hemithyroidectomy | 390 (12.1) | 12.4 | 11.4 | ||
| MNG histological type | 0.010 | ||||
| Classical | 3033 (93.8) | 94.5 | 91.9 | ||
| Hyperplastic | 200 (6.2) | 5.5 | 8.1 | ||
| Hashimoto’s thyroiditis | 385 (11.9) | 9.2 | 17.8 | <0.001 | |
| Chronic non-specific thyroiditis | 284 (8.8) | 6.6 | 13.5 | <0.001 | |
| Histopathological diagnosis | 0.033 | ||||
| Follicular adenoma | 2525 (78.3) | 79.4 | 74.7 | ||
| Hyperplastic adenoma | 420 (13.0) | 12.5 | 14.1 | ||
| Hürthle adenoma | 181 (5.6) | 4.7 | 7.9 | ||
| Thyroid cyst | 65 (2.0) | 2.3 | 1.2 | ||
| C-cell hyperplasia | 42 (1.3) | 1.1 | 2.0 | ||
| Thyroid cancer | 1026 (31.7) | n.a. | |||
| Cancer histological type | n.a. | ||||
| Papillary cancer | 917 (28.4) | ||||
| Papillary microcarcinoma | 572 (17.7) | ||||
| Clinical papillary cancer | 345 (10.7) | ||||
| Follicular cancer | 17 (0.5) | ||||
| Hürthle cell cancer | 65 (2.0) | ||||
| Medullary cancer | 21 (0.6) | ||||
| Anaplastic cancer | 6 (0.2) | ||||
| TSH (munits/l) † | 1.30(1.50) | 1.19(1.54) | 1.51(1.38) | <0.001** | |
| Tg (ng/ml) † | 192.0(333.2) | 188.9(338.3) | 198.5(322.7) | 0.615** | |
| Anti-TPO (units/ml) † | 163.1(681.1) | 167.4(746.7) | 154.8(534.2) | 0.720** | |
| Anti-Tg (units/ml) † | 106.1(429.0) | 93.4(414.3) | 131.8(456.7) | 0.098** | |
| Largest adenoma (mm) † | 34.4(16.6) | 35.2(16.8) | 32.4(15.9) | 0.009** | |
| Second largest adenoma (mm) † | 25.2(12.4) | 25.4(13.0) | 24.4(10.3) | 0.663** | |
| Thyroid gland weight (g) † | 65.4(82.1) | 68.4(84.0) | 56.9(76.3) | 0.003** | |
*With percentages in parentheses unless indicated otherwise;
†values are mean(s.d.).
‡Percentage or mean(s.d.) value in patients without incidental thyroid cancer.
§Percentage or mean(s.d.) value in patients with incidental thyroid cancer.
¶Head and/or neck irradiation during childhood. MNG, multinodular goitre; n.a., not available; TSH, thyroid-stimulating hormone; Tg, thyroglobulin; TPO, thyroid peroxidase.
#χ2 test, except
**Bonferroni post hoc test for continuous variables.