A clinico-pathological and clinico-radiological study of anterior neck swellings

Anterior neck swellings

Abstract

Introduction

            Swelling in anterior neck is a common cause of visit to ENT OPD. Most of the times it is easy to diagnose an anterior neck swelling by clinical, radiological, cytological and histo-pathological examinations. However, if there is any discrepancy or doubt, then there should be a clinico-pathological and clinico-radiological inter-departmental discussion to finalize a diagnosis.

Methodology

            The present study was a prospective longitudinal study conducted in ENT Department of Gujarat Adani Institute of Medical Sciences, Bhuj, from October 2018 to September 2020. The evaluation of patients included clinical, radiological, cytological and histo-pathological examinations. All the data was tabulated in Microsoft excel sheet and analyzed using descriptive statistics.

Results

            In our study, the youngest patient was 4 years old and the eldest patient was of 84 years. The mean age of patients was 40±18.4 years. Out of 150 patients studied, there were 46 males (31%) and 104 females (69%) with female to male ratio is 2.2: 1. Out of 150 cases, 87 (58%) cases were thyroid swellings. Considering histopathology data as gold standard, we found that sensitivity of USG was 79.48 %, that of FNAC was 92.31% and clinical was 92.31% with respect to thyroid swellings, while for non-thyroid swellings, the sensitivity of USG was 50 %, FNAC was 62.5% and clinical was 50%.

Conclusions

            In our study, thyroid swelling was the most common anterior neck swelling, more common in females. Discrepancy in clinico-radio-cyto-histological diagnosis was higher in cases of malignant anterior neck swellings.