Artificial neural network prediction of postoperative complications in papillary thyroid microcarcinoma based on preoperative ultrasonographic features

Objective To predict post‐thyroidectomy complications in papillary thyroid microcarcinoma (PTMC) patients using a deep learning model based on preoperative ultrasonographic features. This study addresses the global rise in PTMC incidence and the challenges in treatment decision‐making with high‐resolution ultrasonography. Method This study enrolled 1638 patients with clinically staged cN0 PTMC who received surgical treatment from 1997 to 2019 at Beijing Friendship Hospital. Deep learning model was developed using fully connected neural network. Feature selection included 1000 iterations of Bootstrap sampling and Recursive Feature Elimination (RFE) to identify the top 10 features. Data preprocessing involved normalization and imputation for missing values. SMOTE addressed class imbalance. The model was trained and tested on random data split, with performance metrics including Accuracy (ACC), Area Under the Curve (AUC), Sensitivity (SEN), and Specificity (SPE), visualized through a ROC curve and confusion matrix. Results The fully connected deep neural network model demonstrated high accuracy (ACC 0.81), Area Under the Curve (AUC 0.74), sensitivity (SEN 0.65), and specificity (SPE 0.83) and visualized by ROC curve and confusion matrix. These results highlight the model's reliability and potential as an effective tool in predicting postoperative complications and assisting in clinical decision‐making for PTMC patients. Conclusion This study highlights the potential of deep learning in enhancing medical predictions and personalized healthcare. Despite promising results, limitations include a single‐center data source and unconsidered factors like lifestyle and genetics. Future research should expand data sources, include more influencing factors, and refine algorithms to improve accuracy and applicability in thyroid cancer treatment. Our study underscores the potential of artificial intelligence, particularly artificial neural networks, in enhancing medical predictions. This AI model has the capability of forecast postoperative complications in cases of papillary thyroid microcarcinoma by analyzing preoperative ultrasonographic features, and demonstrated promising accuracy and reliability. This research paves the way for AI's more profound impact on personalized healthcare and surgical risk assessment.