Patients and Methodology
Review of prospectively maintained MDT minutes between January 2016 to September 2018 identified 153 potentially suitable patients in NHS Lothian with a diagnosis of DTC. These patients were reviewed and a significant number of exclusions were made.
One patient (1%) had MEN2a, 32 (21%) were referred within secondary care and 24 (16%) were recurrent disease. These patients were then excluded. Of the remaining 96 patients, 34 (35%) were incidental tumours and the remaining 62 (65%) patients were referred by a General Practitioner (GP) and diagnosed with a new DTC. These 62 patients were included in the study. Results are recorded as medians (range) unless otherwise indicated.
Data collected included patient demographics, tumour stage and histology, pre-surgical fine needle aspiration (FNA) results and urgency of primary care referral. T-Tests or Chi-Squared tests of significance were performed using SPSS (Statistical Package for the Social Sciences, Version 24) for between-group differences.