ROLE OF SONOELASTOGRAPHY IN THE EVALUATION OF THYROID NODULES

Thyroid nodular disease is one of the most common endocrine disorder. B mode ultrasound provides useful characteristic information about thyroid nodules but it has noticeably low accuracy to differentiate benign from malignant. Fine needle aspiration is widely been used in differentiation of benign and malignant thyroid nodules but it is an invasive procedure. Sonoelastography is a newly developed non- invasive technique which uses ultrasound and gives information about the stiffness of tissue. It estimates the hardness of thyroid lesions in association with adjacent tissues and assists in the differentiation of benign from malignant nodules. Objective: The objective of this study was to evaluate the role sonoelastography in the evaluation of thyroid nodules. Methods: This study was conducted on 72 Patients of age between 18-80 years of either gender at Institute of Nuclear Medicine and Oncology Lahore (INMOL) Pakistan, from 25 March 2019 to 23 August 2019 for duration of five months. Elastography was performed using Toshiba Aplio 500.  Patient having one or more solid nodules in thyroid on conventional ultrasound examination were included in the study and the sonoelastography of nodules was confirmed with histopathological findings of nodules. Results: A total 72 participants were included in our study. The mean age of participants was 42.11 years. Gender distribution shows that 51.4% (n=37) were male and 48.6% (n=35) were female. Sonoelastographic strain ratio of 55.6% nodules (n=40) was more than 2.1(malignant feature) and 44.4% nodules (n=32) have less than 2.1 (benign). Histopathology showed 56.9% of participants (n=41) have malignant nodules and 43.1% (n=31) have benign nodules. The comparison of sonoelastography and histopathology in reference with nodules shows that the results of histopathology and sonoelastography were same and support each other. Conclusion: Sonoelastography is non-invasive and cost-effective imaging technique to diagnose thyroid nodules either benign or malignant. Keywords: Ultrasound Elastography, Thyroid Nodules, Benign, Malignant, Fine Needle Aspiration. DOI : 10.7176/JHMN/66-08 Publication date :September 30 th 2019