Publications
A STUDY OF CLINICAL, IMAGING, AND PATHOLOGICAL CORRELATION OF NECK MASSES
Ramesh Kumar E , Chithra C P , Ramakrishnan V R Background: Most of the neck masses in children are infectious and in adult are neoplastic. There is a need for appropriate evaluation of neck mass. Currently, histopathological evaluation is gold standard and can be done in limited conditions where excision of mass is done. Materials and Methods: It is a prospective study conducted among 86 patients who came with clinically palpable neck mass. Clinical evaluation, USG, FNAC, and histopathological evaluation was done in all cases. Diagnostic accuracy of the tests was measured using sensitivity, specificity, positive predictive value, negative predictive value, and overall diagnostic accuracy, using histo-pathological examination as gold standard. Result: The sensitivity, specificity, PPV and NPV of clinical examination for diagnosing severity of disease was 52.4%, 98.5%, 91.7%% and 86.5%, respectively; with overall diagnostic accuracy of 87.2%. The sensitivity, specificity, PPV and NPV for ultrasound for diagnosing severity of disease was 80.9%, 76.9%, 53.1% and 92.5%, respectively; with overall diagnostic accuracy of 77.9%. Similarly, they were 90%, 100%, 100% and 97.4%, respectively; with overall diagnostic accuracy of 97.9% for FNAC. Conclusion: FNAC has high diagnostic accuracy compared to clinical examination and USG. However, there is a need to reduce the limitations like sampling error and unsatisfactory specimens.
