Calcitonin testing for detection of medullary thyroid cancer in people with thyroid nodules.

CONCLUSIONS: Both basal and combined basal and stimulated calcitonin testing have a high sensitivity and specificity. However, this may be an overestimation due to high risk of bias in the use and choice of reference standard The value of routine testing in patients with thyroid nodules remains questionable, due to the low prevalence, which results in a low PPV of basal calcitonin testing. Whether routine calcitonin testing improves prognosis in MTC patients remains unclear.
PMID: 32176812 [PubMed - in process]

Source: Cochrane Database of Systematic Reviews - March 15, 2020 Category: General Medicine Authors: Verbeek HH, de Groot JWB, Sluiter WJ, Muller Kobold AC, van den Heuvel ER, Plukker JT, Links TP Tags: Cochrane Database Syst Rev Source Type: research