Performance of ACR-TIRADS in assessing thyroid nodules does not vary according to patient age

Aims A few studies have evaluated the performance of the American College of Radiology Thyroid Imaging Reporting And Data System (ACR-TIRADS) in pediatric and elderly patients and found differences between the latter two age groups and middle adulthood.

Thus, the present study was undertaken to explore the possible variation of ACR-TIRADS performance across different ages of patients.

Methods A retrospective population undergoing thyroidectomy was selected to use histology as the reference standard.

Ultrasound images were reviewed, and alignment of ACR-TIRADS with the corresponding histological diagnosis was made afterwards.

Results of the age groups were compared.

The ACR-TIRADS diagnostic performance was calculated considering the assessment of nodules across risk categories (i.e., from TR1 to TR5), rate of unnecessary FNAC (UN-FNAC), and rate of necessary but non-performed FNAC (NNP-FNAC).

Results Overall, 114 patients with a total of 220 nodules (46 carcinomas) were included.

The rate of UN-FNAC was 66.3%, being 93.1% in TR3, 82.1% in TR4, and 31.4% in TR5.

There were 15 NNP-FNACs.

No significant difference was observed between age groups in terms of sample size, nodule, cancer, and FNAC.

The nodule assessment according to ACR-TIRADS categories did not vary across ages.

Sensitivity and specificity recorded in three age tertiles were not significantly different.

Conclusions The present study shows that the performance of ACR-TIRADS is not significantly influenced by patient age.