Pediatric patients with multifocal papillary thyroid cancer have higher recurrence rates than adult patients: a retrospective analysis of a large pediatric thyroid cancer cohort over 33 years

Context: Large-sample studies with long-term follow-up data are limited for pediatric patients with thyroid cancer. Objective: Secular changes in clinicopathological characteristics and outcomes in pediatric patients with thyroid cancer were investigated and compared with those of adults. Design and Patients: A retrospective review of 150 pediatric patients with thyroid cancer managed between 1980 and 2013 was conducted. The long-term outcomes of 124 patients followed up for 12 months or longer were evaluated. Predictors of recurrence-free survival (RFS) in pediatric patients with papillary thyroid cancer (ped-PTC group) were compared with those of 3071 adult patients. Results: The proportion of small tumors (<1 cm) increased from 9.0% before 2010 to 36.8% after 2010 (P < .001); however, neither pathological presentations such as multifocality, extrathyroidal extension (ETE), lymph node (LN) metastasis, or lung metastasis nor the RFS rate changed over time. The 5- and 10-year recurrence rates were 14.5% a...