Significance of computed tomography for the diagnosis of goiter

Since the thyroid has a great affinity for iodine, it should be visualized in computed tomography (CT) as a high density area. With this in mind, CT has been used experimentally in order to diagnose and analyse its pathological state. The results obtained are as follows: 1. CT gave information on the nature of a lesion as well as on the locality and the extent. It was considered to be exceedingly useful in thyroid surgery. 2. To facilitate the clinical and diagnostic evaluation, images of the thyroid gland were classified into following five types: Type I, normal; Type II (enlarged pattern), observed in hyperthyroidism; Type III (cystic pattern), found mainly in adenoma; Type IVa (mottled pattern), often found in chronic thyroiditis; Type IVb (scattered pattern), found in adenoma, adenomatous goiter, and sometimes in cancer; Type V (parenchymatous pattern), found mainly in cancer, especially in papillary type, and is considered to be malignant. 3. The diagnostic minimum size of a nodule is considered to be 0.5-0.7 cm in diameter. 4. The diagnostic significance of CT number, which indicates a numerical and objective value, was not established in this study. Further study is required on this subject. (author)