Table 2.

Clinical and histopathological characteristics of encapsulated (all cured) and non-encapsulated MTC (cured and not cured).

Tumor capsule	Present	Absent
No. of patients (%)	7 (15.9)	37 (84.1)
Biochemical cure	Cured (n = 30, 68.2%)		Not cured (n = 14, 31.8%)
No. of patients (%)	7 (100)	23 (62.2)	14 (31.8)
Age at thyroidectomy, years [median, (IQR), range]	57 [34–60] (27–65)	56 [48–69] (7–78)	55 [45.3–66] (31–77)
Gender, no. of female/male patients	3/4	19/4	5/9
Hereditary/sporadic MTC	0/7	2/21	4/10
Preoperative Ctn level, pg/mL [median, (IQR), range]	398 [126.5–7336] (102–13540)	75 [42.2–127] (12.6–337)	787 [340.5–2905.5] (90.2–9916)
Primary tumor size, mm [median, (IQR), range]	33 [20–38] (14–65)	8.6 [6–15] (1–35)	16 [12–22.3] (7–41)
No. of patients with multifocal MTC (%)	0 (0)	2 (8.7)	4 (28.6)
No. of patients with intratumoral gross calcifications (%)	3 (42.9)	0 (0)	3 (21.4)
No. of patients with desmoplastic stromal reaction, DSR (%)	2/6 (33.3)	7/11 (63.6)	9/9 (100)
No. of patients with extrathyroid extension, ETE (%)	0 (0)	0 (0)	4 (28.6)
No. of patients with vascular invasion (%)	0 (0)	0 (0)	10 (71.4)
No. of patients with nodal disease, N+ (%)	0 (0)	3 (13)	12 (85.7)
N+ in the central compartment, N1a	0 (0)	3 (100)	12 (100)
N+ in the laterocervical compartment, N1b	0 (0)	0 (0)	9 (60)
No. of node metastases removed, total [median, (IQR), range]	0 (0)	7 (0) [0] (0–3)	140 (7) [2–15.5] (0–39)
No. of nodes removed, total [median, (IQR), range]	72 (7) [1–13] (0–39)	92 (1) [0–7] (0–22)	380 (31) [15.5–48] (6–82)
AJCC TNM 8th edition clinical staging (%)
Stage I	2 (28.6)	18 (78.3)	2 (14.3)
Stage II	5 (71.4)	2 (8.7)	0 (0)
Stage III	0 (0)	3 (13)	3 (21.4)
Stage IVA	0 (0)	0 (0)	9 (64.3)
Stage IVB	0 (0)	0 (0)	0 (0)
Stage IVC	0 (0)	0 (0)	0 (0)
Follow-up, months [median, (IQR), range]	18.9 [16.1–23.9] (11–132.8)	54.8 [19.6–112] (3.5–350.6)	20.9 [6.3–47.1] (0.3–158.3)

AJCC TNM, American Joint Committee on Cancer Tumor-Node-Metastases; Ctn, calcitonin; IQR, interquartile range.