In order to assess the dialgnostic significance of nuclear grooves in cytologic smears, the pesence of this feature was evaluated in needle aspiration from 14 papillary carcinomas., 9 follicular adenomas, 1follicular carcinoma, 11 adenomatous
goiters
and 3 cases of Hashimoto's thyroiditis, all of which were histologically confirmed. Nuclear grooves were observed in 13 out of 14 papillary carcinomas(93%), 6 out of 9 follicular adenomas(67%), and 1 out of 11 adenomatous goiters(9%). They were
not
observed in cases of follicular carcinoma and thyroiditis.
Grooves, however, in follicular adenomas and adenomatous goiters were fewer in number and not as distince as those in papillary carcinomas. Since artifacts such as linearly aligned nuclear chromatin, different stainability in a single nucleus,
folding
over of nuclear membrane and overlapped nuclei may be indistinguishable from the grooves, grooves should be interpreted cautiously and used in conjunction with other criteria in the diagnosis of papillary carcinoma Observation of nuclear
infoldings
in
oil immersion level would be important in the diagnosis of papillary carcinoma.
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