Skip to main content

Advertisement

SpringerLink
Log in

A nomogram and risk classification system for predicting cancer-specific survival in tall cell variant of papillary thyroid cancer: a SEER-based study

  • Original Article
  • Published:
Journal of Endocrinological Investigation Aims and scope Submit manuscript

Abstract

Background

Tall cell variant (TCV) of papillary thyroid cancer (PTC) is the most common aggressive subtype of PTC. The factors that affect survival of patients with TCV remain unclear. We aimed to develop a model to predict the cancer-specific survival (CSS).

Methods

A total of 1615 patients diagnosed with TCV between 2004 and 2016 were identified from the Surveillance, Epidemiology, and End Results (SEER) database and randomized into training and validation cohorts (7:3). A predictive nomogram for predicting CSS was constructed by Cox proportional hazards regression and validated by concordance index (C-index), calibration curve, and decision curve analyses (DCA). A risk classification system was built based on the total nomogram scores of each case.

Results

A nomogram was constructed including five independent prognostic factors (age, tumor size, T stage, M stage, and extent of surgery) associated with CSS in TCV patients. Various validations proved that the nomogram model had good consistency and discrimination for TCV prognosis. The risk classification system could perfectly classify TCV patients into three risk groups with significantly different CSS. Compared with traditional AJCC TNM staging system, the nomogram could better predict CSS in TCV patients.

Conclusions

A nomogram and corresponding risk classification system were developed for predicting CSS in TCV patients. The model has excellent performance and can be used to help clinicians make accurate prognostic assessment and individualized treatment.

This is a preview of subscription content, log in via an institution to check access.

Access this article

Log in via an institution

Price excludes VAT (USA)
Tax calculation will be finalised during checkout.

Instant access to the full article PDF.

Institutional subscriptions

Fig. 1
Fig. 2
Fig. 3
Fig. 4
Fig. 5

Similar content being viewed by others

Availability of data and materials

The datasets generated during and/or analyzed during the current study are available from the corresponding author on reasonable request.

References

  1. Axelsson TA, Hrafnkelsson J, Olafsdottir EJ et al (2015) Tall cell variant of papillary thyroid carcinoma: a population-based study in Iceland. Thyroid 25:216–220. https://doi.org/10.1089/thy.2014.0075

    Article  PubMed  Google Scholar 

  2. Prendiville S, Burman KD, Ringel MD et al (2000) Tall cell variant: an aggressive form of papillary thyroid carcinoma. Otolaryngol Head Neck Surg 122:352–357. https://doi.org/10.1016/S0194-5998(00)70047-7

    Article  CAS  PubMed  Google Scholar 

  3. Hawk WA, Hazard JB (1976) The many appearances of papillary carcinoma of the thyroid. Cleve Clin Q 43:207–215. https://doi.org/10.3949/ccjm.43.4.207

    Article  CAS  PubMed  Google Scholar 

  4. DeLellis RA, Hp LR, Eng C (2004) World Health Organization classification of tumours: pathology and genetics of tumours of endocrine organs. IARC Press, Lyon, pp 57–66

    Google Scholar 

  5. L AK (2017) Pathology of endocrine tumors update: World Health Organization new classification 2017—other thyroid tumors. AJSP Rev Rep 22:209–216

    Google Scholar 

  6. Regalbuto C, Malandrino P, Frasca F et al (2013) The tall cell variant of papillary thyroid carcinoma: clinical and pathological features and outcomes. J Endocrinol Invest 36:249–254. https://doi.org/10.3275/8515

    Article  CAS  PubMed  Google Scholar 

  7. Gunalp B, Okuyucu K, Ince S et al (2017) Impact of tall cell variant histology on predicting relapse and changing the management of papillary thyroid carcinoma patients. Hell J Nucl Med 20:122–127. https://doi.org/10.1967/s002449910552

    Article  PubMed  Google Scholar 

  8. Leung AK, Chow SM, Law SC (2008) Clinical features and outcome of the tall cell variant of papillary thyroid carcinoma. Laryngoscope 118:32–38. https://doi.org/10.1097/MLG.0b013e318156f6c3

    Article  PubMed  Google Scholar 

  9. Feng J, Shen F, Cai W et al (2018) Survival of aggressive variants of papillary thyroid carcinoma in patients under 55 years old: a SEER population-based retrospective analysis. Endocrine 61:499–505. https://doi.org/10.1007/s12020-018-1644-y

    Article  CAS  PubMed  Google Scholar 

  10. Kazaure HS, Roman SA, Sosa JA (2012) Aggressive variants of papillary thyroid cancer: incidence, characteristics and predictors of survival among 43,738 patients. Ann Surg Oncol 19:1874–1880. https://doi.org/10.1245/s10434-011-2129-x

    Article  PubMed  Google Scholar 

  11. Kuo EJ, Goffredo P, Sosa JA et al (2013) Aggressive variants of papillary thyroid microcarcinoma are associated with extrathyroidal spread and lymph-node metastases: a population-level analysis. Thyroid 23:1305–1311. https://doi.org/10.1089/thy.2012.0563

    Article  CAS  PubMed  PubMed Central  Google Scholar 

  12. Morris LG, Shaha AR, Tuttle RM et al (2010) Tall-cell variant of papillary thyroid carcinoma: a matched-pair analysis of survival. Thyroid 20:153–158. https://doi.org/10.1089/thy.2009.0352

    Article  PubMed  PubMed Central  Google Scholar 

  13. Balachandran VP, Gonen M, Smith JJ et al (2015) Nomograms in oncology: more than meets the eye. Lancet Oncol 16:e173-180. https://doi.org/10.1016/S1470-2045(14)71116-7

    Article  PubMed  PubMed Central  Google Scholar 

  14. Cavalieri S, Mariani L, Vander Poorten V et al (2020) Prognostic nomogram in patients with metastatic adenoid cystic carcinoma of the salivary glands. Eur J Cancer 136:35–42. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.ejca.2020.05.013

    Article  PubMed  Google Scholar 

  15. Li W, Xiao Y, Xu X et al (2021) A novel nomogram and risk classification system predicting the cancer-specific mortality of patients with initially diagnosed metastatic cutaneous melanoma. Ann Surg Oncol 28:3490–3500. https://doi.org/10.1245/s10434-020-09341-5

    Article  PubMed  Google Scholar 

  16. Wu J, Zhang H, Li L et al (2020) A nomogram for predicting overall survival in patients with low-grade endometrial stromal sarcoma: a population-based analysis. Cancer Commun (Lond) 40:301–312. https://doi.org/10.1002/cac2.12067

    Article  PubMed  Google Scholar 

  17. Camp RL, Dolled-Filhart M, Rimm DL (2004) X-tile: a new bio-informatics tool for biomarker assessment and outcome-based cut-point optimization. Clin Cancer Res 10:7252–7259. https://doi.org/10.1158/1078-0432.CCR-04-0713

    Article  CAS  PubMed  Google Scholar 

  18. Longheu A, Canu GL, Cappellacci F et al (2020) Tall cell variant versus conventional papillary thyroid carcinoma: a retrospective analysis in 351 consecutive patients. J Clin Med 10:70. https://doi.org/10.3390/jcm10010070

    Article  PubMed  PubMed Central  Google Scholar 

  19. Michels JJ, Jacques M, Henry-Amar M et al (2007) Prevalence and prognostic significance of tall cell variant of papillary thyroid carcinoma. Hum Pathol 38:212–219. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.humpath.2006.08.001

    Article  PubMed  Google Scholar 

  20. Terry JH, St John SA, Karkowski FJ et al (1994) Tall cell papillary thyroid cancer: incidence and prognosis. Am J Surg 168:459–461. https://doi.org/10.1016/s0002-9610(05)80099-6

    Article  CAS  PubMed  Google Scholar 

  21. Wang X, Cheng W, Liu C et al (2016) Tall cell variant of papillary thyroid carcinoma: current evidence on clinicopathologic features and molecular biology. Oncotarget 7:40792–40799. https://doi.org/10.18632/oncotarget.8215

    Article  PubMed  PubMed Central  Google Scholar 

  22. Silver CE, Owen RP, Rodrigo JP et al (2011) Aggressive variants of papillary thyroid carcinoma. Head Neck 33:1052–1059. https://doi.org/10.1002/hed.21494

    Article  PubMed  Google Scholar 

  23. Ghossein R, Livolsi VA (2008) Papillary thyroid carcinoma tall cell variant. Thyroid 18:1179–1181. https://doi.org/10.1089/thy.2008.0164

    Article  CAS  PubMed  Google Scholar 

Download references

Acknowledgements

We acknowledged the contributions of the Surveillance, Epidemiology, and End Results (SEER) Program registries for creating and updating the SEER database.

Funding

This work was supported by Department of Science and Technology of Sichuan Province (20ZDYF2669). The funder had no role in study design, data collection and analysis, decision to publish, or preparation of the manuscript.

Author information

Authors and Affiliations

  1. Department of Thyroid & Parathyroid Surgery, Laboratory of Thyroid and Parathyroid Disease, Frontiers Science Center for Disease-Related Molecular Network, West China Hospital, Sichuan University, Chengdu, China

    X. Wang, X. Zheng, J. Zhu, Z. Li & T. Wei

Authors
  1. X. Wang
    View author publications

    You can also search for this author in PubMed Google Scholar

  2. X. Zheng
    View author publications

    You can also search for this author in PubMed Google Scholar

  3. J. Zhu
    View author publications

    You can also search for this author in PubMed Google Scholar

  4. Z. Li
    View author publications

    You can also search for this author in PubMed Google Scholar

  5. T. Wei
    View author publications

    You can also search for this author in PubMed Google Scholar

Contributions

Conception and design: XW and TW. Administrative support: ZL and TW. Provision of study materials or patients: XW, XZ and JZ. Collection and assembly of data: XW, XZ and TW. Data analysis and interpretation: XW, JZ and ZL. Manuscript writing: all authors. Final approval of manuscript: all authors.

Corresponding author

Correspondence to T. Wei.

Ethics declarations

Conflict of interest

The authors declare that they have no conflict of interest.

Ethical approval

This study was granted exemption by the Institutional Review Board of Sichuan University because of the publicity and anonymity of SEER data.

Research involving human participants and/or animals

This study does not contain any studies with human participants performed by any of the authors.

Informed consent

Not applicable.

Consent for publication

Not applicable.

Additional information

Publisher's Note

Springer Nature remains neutral with regard to jurisdictional claims in published maps and institutional affiliations.

Rights and permissions

Springer Nature or its licensor (e.g. a society or other partner) holds exclusive rights to this article under a publishing agreement with the author(s) or other rightsholder(s); author self-archiving of the accepted manuscript version of this article is solely governed by the terms of such publishing agreement and applicable law.

Reprints and permissions

About this article

Check for updates. Verify currency and authenticity via CrossMark

Cite this article

Wang, X., Zheng, X., Zhu, J. et al. A nomogram and risk classification system for predicting cancer-specific survival in tall cell variant of papillary thyroid cancer: a SEER-based study. J Endocrinol Invest 46, 893–901 (2023). https://doi.org/10.1007/s40618-022-01949-6

Download citation

  • Received:

  • Accepted:

  • Published:

  • Issue Date:

  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s40618-022-01949-6

Keywords

Search

Navigation