Value of cluster of differentiation 56, Hector Battifora mesothelial-1, and cytokeratin 19 expression in predicting the risk of papillary thyroid carcinoma occurrence in Hashimoto's thyroiditis patients, which will advise early total thyroidectomy in those patients

Background There were no previous studies that have tried to find the prediction of papillary thyroid carcinoma (PTC) occurrence in Hashimoto's thyroiditis (HT) that will advise early thyroidectomy in HT cases with high risk of progression to PTC. We aimed to use a panel of cluster of differentiation 56 (CD56), Hector Battifora mesothelial-1 (HBME-1), and cytokeratin 19 (CK19) to detect their predictive ability for HT progression into PTC. Patients and methods We included five groups of paraffin blocks that were retrieved from 70 patients. The first group included 20 cases of PTC, the second group included 20 samples from the same cases previously diagnosed as HT, the third group included 30 cases of HT, the fourth group included 30 samples from the same cases previously diagnosed as HT, and the fifth group had 20 cases of PTC without a history of HT. The sections were stained by CD56, HBME-1, and CK19 using immunohistochemistry. Results There is a significant difference between the second (HT that will be transformed to PTC) and the fourth (HT that will not be transformed to PTC) groups as regards CD56, HBME-1, and CK19 expression (P=0.012). For the differentiation between HT that will be transformed to PTC from HT that will not be transformed to PTC, negative CD56 expression was of highest sensitivity (90%) and diffuse positive HBME-1 expression was of highest specificity (95.7%). Conclusion A combination of negative CD56 expression and diffuse positive HBME-1 could be used with high sensitivity and specificity in predicting PTC occurrence in certain cases of HT and these patients will be advised to early total thyroidectomy to avoid PTC occurrence in the future.