Hemithyroidectomy: when it is necessary an intraoperative frozen-section biopsy?

Many surgeons use intraoperative frozen section biopsy of the thyroid nodules to confirm malignant disease, but it continues to generate considerable controversy. We reviewed our recent experience to determinate de clinical utility of frozen section in our surgical management and intraoperative decision-making. All patients who had operations for the thyroid nodular disease between 2000 and 2006 were included in this retrospective study. We compared the results of frozen section diagnosis and definitive histologic results in a population of 212 patients. Frozen section was false negative in 3 patients (1.66 %) and false positive in 1 (0.47 %) and avoided 12 reoperations (5.6 %). When there was not suspicious malignant disease had a sensitivity of 0.75 %. In the group of follicular disease the sensitivity was 3.7 %, and in the group with suspicious malignant disease was 37.5 %. Frozen section was more helpful in the group of suspicious for malignant disease. It does not seem to be necessary when fine-needle biopsy indicates bening or follicular disease.