Integration of a postoperative calcitonin measurement into an anatomical staging system improves initial risk stratification in medullary thyroid cancer.

Objective: Staging systems applied to medullary thyroid cancer (MTC) rely on initial clinical and pathological features and do not consider the response to treatment. To determine whether MTC staging can be improved by incorporating the first postoperative calcitonin measurement.

Patients And Measurements: Eighty-five patients being monitored for MTC (median follow-up 5 years) were retrospectively classified according to both the American Joint Committee on Cancer (AJCC) and the proposed combined risk stratification system (low, intermediate and high risk), which incorporates the first postoperative calcitonin measurement, using the outcomes no evidence of disease (NED), biochemical evidence of disease, structurally identifiable disease and death.