Ultrasound Outperforms Symptom Analysis in Detecting Ovarian Cancer

In a recent study, physicians compared symptom analysis to ultrasound in predicting ovarian cancer.

The researchers from the University of Kentucky Chandler Medical Center-Markey Cancer Center (Lexington, KY, USA) selected 272 women participating in yearly transvaginal screening (TVS) from 31,748 women enrolled in a free screening project at the university, comparing symptom results to ultrasound and surgical pathology findings. They found TVS performed better than symptoms analysis for detecting malignancies (73.3% versus 20% sensitivity).

Whereas symptoms analysis performed better for distinguishing benign tumors (91.3% versus 74.4% specificity), adding symptom analysis to TVS actually resulted in poorer identification of malignancy (sensitivity = 16.7%), even as it improved the ability to distinguish benign tumors (specificity = 97.9%).

The investigators reported that the data indicate that while symptoms do identify ovarian malignancies, they are not as accurate as TVS. They added that informative symptoms could be expected to be absent in 80% of ovarian malignancies.

The study was published in the August 15, 2009, issue of the journal Cancer.

Related Links:
University of Kentucky Chandler Medical Center-Markey Cancer Center