Flow cytometric DNA analysis of thyroid carcinoma.

Abnormal DNA content has been considered as an additional criterion for determining the biological behavior of a tumor. Flowcytometric DNA analysis was done on 121 patients with thyroid carcinoma encountered during the period between 1975 and 1987. Tumor tissues were sampled from paraffin-embedded blocks and the histology of thyroid carcinoma found to consist of 91 papillary, 23 follicular, 2 medullary, 1 squamous cell and 4 anaplastic carcinomas. The incidence of aneuploidy in thyroid carcinoma was 7.4 per cent (9 patients) while that of diploidy was 92.6 per cent (112 patients). The aneuploid specimens consisted of 6 papillary, 1 follicular, 1 medullary and 1 anaplastic carcinomas and, of 4 anaplastic carcinoma patients with subsequent death within 6 months, only 1 was aneuploid. As an indicator of proliferative potential, S-phase fraction (SPF) was also determined by flow cytometry, but this could not be used as an independent prognostic factor. The aneuploid patients showed a significantly decreased survival rate (p less than 0.01). Thus, although DNA measurement proved useful for predicting the survival of aneuploid patients, there is some discrepancy between DNA content and the biological behavior of the tumor.