Risk for Thyroid Cancer Recurrence Is Higher in Men Than in Women Independent of Disease Stage at Presentation

Abstract

Background: Well-differentiated thyroid cancer (DTC) presents at a more advanced stage in men than in women, and the mortality in men is higher than that in women. However, it is not clear whether DTC recurrence is affected by sex independent of stage at presentation. The objective of the present study was to assess if male sex is an independent risk factor for recurrence of DTC. Methods: The Canadian Collaborative Network for Cancer of the Thyroid (CANNECT) is a collaborative registry to describe patterns of care for thyroid cancer. We included patients from the CANNECT registry with DTC diagnosed at age 18 or older between 2000 and 2010. We compared men and women with respect to presentation, management, and recurrence risk, stratified for American Joint Committee on Cancer (AJCC) stage. Results: We included 2595 patients, 2067 (79.7%) women and 528 (20.3%) men. Men presented with more advanced AJCC stage (p < 0.001), T stage (p < 0.001), N stage (p < 0.001), and M stage (p = 0.002) There was no difference in follow-up duration between women (7.7-4.0 [meanstandard deviation] years) and men (7.7-4.0 years, p = 0.985). Overall recurrence was 2.2% (n = 46) for women and 8.5% (n = 45) for men (p < 0.001). In multivariate analysis adjusted for AJCC stage, men were at significantly greater risk for DTC recurrence than women (adjusted hazard ratio 2.72 [95% confidence interval [CI] 1.78-4.20]; p < 0.001). In multivariate analysis adjusted for tumor-node-metastasis (TNM) stage, men were at significantly greater risk for DTC recurrence than women (adjusted hazard ratio 2.31 [CI 1.48-3.60]; p < 0.001). Conclusions: Our study confirms that the risk for recurrence of DTC is higher in men than in women. Although men tend to present with more advanced-stage disease, the difference in recurrence risk persists when adjusted for stage of presentation. It needs to be determined whether sex should influence follow-up intensity and/or duration.

GADD45B Transcript Is a Prognostic Marker in Papillary Thyroid Carcinoma Patients Treated With Total Thyroidectomy and Radioiodine Therapy

“…Groups were compared using the limma package (P < 0.01) (29), adopting a fold change (FC) ≥ 1.5 to define differential expression. Since male patients usually present a worse prognosis (30), representing a potential bias in our study, genes found as more or less expressed according to gender and mapped in X or Y chromosomes were excluded. Hierarchical clustering analysis was performed with Euclidean distance and complete linkage using ComplexHeatmap package (31) available for R program.…”

A Retrospective Case-control Study of Tumor Characteristics of Coexistent Papillary Thyroid Carcinoma Diagnosed in Surgically Treated Patients for Secondary Hyperparathyroidism: Higher Incidence and More Often Occult Papillary Thyroid Carcinoma

“…As previously proved, both gender and age are associated with the development of PTC [18]. The group PTC + SHPT contained 34 patients, 44.1% men and 55.9% women, whose average age was 47 years old.…”

Coexistence of Papillary Thyroid Carcinoma in Secondary Hyperparathyroidism

“…As previously proved, both gender and age are associated with the development of PTC [21]. The PTC + SHPT group contained 34 patients, 44.1% men and 55.9% women, whose average age was 47 years old.…”