Diagnostic Accuracy of Fine Needle Aspiration Cytology (FNAC) in Metastatic Lymphadenopathy
Keywords:
Fine needle aspiration cytology, FNAC,, Lymph node, Lymphadenopathy, MetastasisAbstract
Objective: To determine the diagnostic accuracy of Fine needle aspiration cytology (FNAC) in metastatic
lymphadenopathy, using histopathology of the same lymph node as a gold standard
Study Design: Cross sectional study
Setting: Department of Pathology, Pakistan Institute of Medical Sciences (PIMS), Islamabad
Duration of study: Samples were collected from 13th April, 2011 to 09th February, 2013
Methodology: After getting adequate clinical data, patients underwent FNAC. The slides were stained
with Hematoxylin and Eosin (H&E), evaluated according to the set criteria and compared with histopathological
slides
Results: All of the 54 cases were found to be lymph node lesions. Mean age was 45.17± 17.1 years. Male
to female ratio was 1:1.08. Most of the smears were hypercellular. Most common metastatic tumor was
Metastatic Squamous Cell Carcinoma (51.85%), followed by Metastatic Adenocarcinoma (7.41%). In 38
cases, the involved lymph node was found to be cervical, followed by supraclavicular lymph node
which was involved in 9 cases. Axillary and inguinal lymph nodes comprised 4 and 3 cases respectively.
A strong correlation was found between the diagnosis made by fine needle aspiration cytology and
the final histopathological diagnosis. The sensitivity and specificity of FNAC came out to be 97.37%
and 93.75% respectively with an overall diagnostic accuracy of 96.29%.
Conclusion: Fine needle aspiration cytology (FNAC) is a useful diagnostic test in metastatic lesions of
lymph nodes because it is rapid, simple and inexpensive and has high diagnostic accuracy.
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Copyright (c) 2018 Farhan Abbas Baloch, Farhan Abbas Baloch, Ahmareen Khalid
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