Background and Objectives: Ultrasound guided fine needle aspiration cytology (US-FNA) is one of the most useful techniques for diagnosing cervical lymphadenopathy; FNA, however, has a high rate of diagnostic limitation, especially in lymphoma. Recentl...
Background and Objectives: Ultrasound guided fine needle aspiration cytology (US-FNA) is one of the most useful techniques for diagnosing cervical lymphadenopathy; FNA, however, has a high rate of diagnostic limitation, especially in lymphoma. Recently, ultrasound guided core needle gun biopsy (US-CNB) has become an important diagnostic modality; its value, however, is undetermined. The purpose of this study is to evaluate the effectiveness of US-CNB in the diagnosis of cervical lymphadenopathy in the outpatient clinics.
Materials & Methods: A prospective study was designed. US-CNB was performed on 79 enlarged cervical lymph nodes (>1.0 cm) of 79 patients who were not suspected to have squamous cell carcinoma and did not have history of malignancy from January 2006 to July 2009. Diagnostic sensitivity, specificity and accuracy of US-CNB in differentiating malignancy from benign lymphadenopathy were evaluated. All the patients were planned to be performed US-FNA before the performing US-CNB; the results of US-CNB were compared with those of US-FNA Results: Correct histopathological diagnoses by US-CNB were obtained from 73 of 79 patients (92.4%); reactive hyperplasia was 26 patients, Kikuchi’s disease, 17, tuberculous lymphadenitis, 15, lymphoma, 8, metastatic carcinoma, 3, etc. The diagnostic sensitivity of US-CNB was 91.6%, specificity was 100%, and diagnostic accuracy was 98.6% in differentiating malignant from benign lymphadenopathy. US-CNB achieved a higher accuracy than US-FNA in identifying lymphoma (88.8% vs. 11.1%) and Kikuchi’s disease (89.4% vs. 29.4%). No specific complications were seen in the US-CNB.
Conclusion: US-CNB should be a safe and effective procedure in the diagnosis of cervical lymphadenopathy with a high diagnostic yield. It can be a useful screening test for cervical lympadenopathy, including lymphoma and Kikuchi’s disease, and can be an alternative diagnostic tool for those diseases with consideration of clinical information.