Application of artificial neural network for classification of thyroid follicular tumors.

Objective: To analyze smears of 197 thyroid follicular tumors (adenoma and carcinoma).

Study Design: Several types of artificial neural networks (ANN) of various designs were used for diagnosis of thyroid follicular tumors. The typical complex of cytologic features, some nuclear morphometric parameters (area, perimeter, shape factor) and density features of chromatin texture (mean value and SD of gray levels) were defined for each tumor.