Which Clinicopathological Factors Are Related to Tumor Size in Papillary Thyroid Cancer?

Purpose: Papillary thyroid cancer (PTC) is the most common endocrine cancer worldwide. Tumor size on observation, together with lymph node metastasis, serves as a determinant of surgery. However, not all patients with PTC experience an increase in the size of tumor. We investigated various clinicopathological factors associated with the size of tumor to discern the group that can be observed without the need for early surgery. Methods: The records of 1,401 patients diagnosed with PTC (excluding the follicular variant) between 2015 and 2017, were reviewed. Clinicopathological features suspected to have a link to tumor growth were included, such as diabetes mellitus (DM), use of metformin, a surgical history of breast, ovary, uterine, or familial non-medullary thyroid cancer, B-type Raf kinase (BRAF) V600E mutation, and lymphovascular invasion (LVI). Results: Size of tumor was found to be related to sex, age, hypertension, ovary-uterine surgery, LVI and psammoma bodies. However, after adjusting for the effects of other factors on tumor size, both age and LVI were found to be significantly related to tumor size, with age also being significantly related to LVI. Conclusion: Age and LVI are significant factors in the enlargement of tumors, unlike several other features, including DM, breast cancer history, familial cancer history, Graves s disease, Hashimoto s thyroiditis, and BRAF mutation.