Premium
Fine needle aspiration cytology of ovarian lesions: Is it reliable?
Author(s) -
KADIVAR Maryam,
KARAMVANDI Mahvash
Publication year - 2008
Publication title -
asia‐pacific journal of clinical oncology
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 0.73
H-Index - 29
eISSN - 1743-7563
pISSN - 1743-7555
DOI - 10.1111/j.1743-7563.2008.00186.x
Subject(s) - medicine , fine needle aspiration , papanicolaou stain , cytology , follicular cyst , fine needle aspiration cytology , radiology , cytopathology , cyst , pathology , biopsy , cancer , cervical cancer
Aim: To assess the diagnostic value of fine needle aspiration cytology (FNAC) in evaluating ovarian lesions. Methods: Over a two‐year period, fine needle aspiration was performed on surgically removed ovarian masses from 75 patients, aged 20 to 56 years. Smears of the aspirated material stained by Papanicolaou, HE and Wright methods were evaluated by a pathologist who was blinded to the final histopathological diagnoses. Results: Smears of approximately half (32 of 75) of the aspirates were acellular. The remaining 43 aspirates consisted of 15 follicular cysts, two endometrioid cysts, three inflammatory processes and 23 neoplastic lesions. The malignant nature of 13 of the 15 (86%) malignant lesions was diagnosed correctly. Of these, three could not be classified into a specific subtype. Fifteen of the 25 (60%) follicular cysts were diagnosed correctly. In our study, the overall sensitivity and specificity of ovarian aspiration cytology for the diagnosis of malignant lesions were 86% and 100%, respectively. Cytological diagnosis of the benign lesions had a sensitivity of 48% and a specificity of 92%. Conclusion: Ovarian masses are easily accessible for cytological evaluation by fine needle aspiration during laparoscopy or sonography. We studied fine needle aspiration material from surgically removed specimens. However, the results can be extrapolated to real practice. Aspiration cytology can provide particularly useful information in young women with functional ovarian cysts, preventing unnecessary operations. Acellular cystic fluids should not be considered non‐diagnostic because they represent benign cysts in the majority of cases.