Fine Needle Aspiration of Unilocular Ovarian Cysts- a Cytohistological Correlation

Objective: To assess the diagnostic efficacy of Fine Needle Aspiration Cytology in differentiating neoplastic and non-neoplastic dysfunctional ovarian cysts- cytological findings to be verified with histology of excised cyst. Methods: In this prospective study fifty-three cases with unilocular nonseptate ovarian cystic masses,detected on ultrasound examination were subjected to ultrasound guided fine needle aspiration of the cyst contents at Department of Pathology, Allama Iqbal Medical College Lahore, from January 1999- January 2000. Aspirated fluid was examined cytologicaly using Giemsa stain on the smears prepared from centrifuged deposit.The same cyst removed surgically was examined histologicaly and cytohistological correlation was carried out. Results: In this series of 53 cases, histologically confirmed break up of various types of cysts was follicular cysts (n=25) , leuteal cysts (n=6), serous cysts (n=15), mucous cysts (N=4) and Endometriotic cysts (n=3). Non-diagnostic fine needle aspirate was obtained in 19/53 cases, majority being the follicular cysts. The cytohistolog-ical correlation revealed no false positive but 40 % false negative results for follicular cysts on cytological exam-ination of the aspirate. Hence the specificity and sensitivity for cytological diagnosis of follicular cyst was 100 % and 60 % respectively. For leuteal cysts, false positive and false negative results on cytological exam-ination were 0 % and 16.6 % respectively with a specificity and sensitivity value of 100 % and 83 % respec