Diagnostic Performance and Agreement of Preoperative, Intraoperative Evaluations, and Final Pathology for Lymphadenectomy and Lymph Node Involvement in Endometrial Cancer.

Objective: To determine the accuracy of clinical parameters examined by preoperative and intraoperative evaluations compared with final histological results in patients with endometrial cancer, and to evaluate the application of preoperative investigations, intraoperative evaluations, and final histological results in predicting lymph node involvement

Material And Method: The medical records of the patients diagnosed with endometrial cancer who had surgical staging between January 1, 2006 and December 31, 2012 at Songklanagarind Hospital were retrospectively reviewed. The agreement of clinical parameters identified through preoperative investigations and intraoperative evaluations with the final histology findings were calculated using kappa statistics. The diagnostic performance of preoperative investigations, intraoperative evaluations, and final histological results to predict lymph node involvement were calculated in terms of sensitivity, specificity, positive predictive value, and negative predictive value.

Results: Preoperative investigations showed a slight to fair agreement whereas intraoperative evaluations had a fair to moderate agreement in detecting clinical parameters compared with the final histological results. Endocervical curettage and endometrial biopsy exhibited the highest sensitivity, pelvic ultrasonography the highest specificity, and intraoperative evaluations had a high-level sensitivity and specificity

Conclusion: Preoperative investigations have role as an adjunctive evaluation, whereas intraoperative gross assessment remains the most accurate and useful method of detecting patients for lymphadenectomy.