[Preoperative diagnosis using color Doppler flowmetry in focal and diffuse thyroid pathology].

Color-doppler was first used in the study and classification of specific pathologies in 1992. One hundred and eighteen patients with focal and diffuse thyroid pathologies underwent color-doppler, flowmetry analysis and peak systolic velocity measurement (CD-FM-PSV). The PSV results allowed us to identify two subclasses a and b in class three and four (a: = < or = 30 cm/sec., b: = > 30 cm/sec.). Class 3a and 3b lesions are the most likely to represent neoplastic nodules. Based on our results, we assigned 58 patients to type 2 (follicular hyperplasia), 20 patients to type 3a (follicular adenoma and carcinomas), 16 patients to type 3b (carcinomas and Plummer's adenoma), 15 patients to type 4a (autoimmune thyroiditis and hypothyroidism) and 12 patients to type 4b (Graves' disease). Preliminary results were compared with FNAB, intra-operative and post-operative histological data. The specificity of CD-FM-PSV in diagnosis is 86%. We have concluded that CD-FM-PSV is an effective imaging technique for pre-operative diagnosis of thyroid pathologies and along with FNAB, a adequate predictive tool for thyroid nodules.