Clinical diagnostic value of American College of Radiology thyroid imaging report and data system in different kinds of thyroid nodules

BACKGROUND: To evaluate the diagnostic value of American College of Radiology (ACR) score and ACR Thyroid Imaging Report and Data System (TI-RADS) for benign nodules, medullary thyroid carcinoma (MTC) and papillary thyroid carcinoma (PTC) through comparing with Kwak TI-RADS. METHODS: Five hundred nine patients diagnosed with PTC, MTC or benign thyroid nodules were included and classified into the benign thyroid nodules group (n = 264), the PTC group (n = 189) and the MTC group (n = 56). The area under the curve (AUC) values were analyzed and the receiver operator characteristic (ROC) curves were drawn to compare the diagnostic efficiencies of ACR score, ACR TI-RADS and KWAK TI-RADS on benign thyroid nodules, MTC and PTC. RESULTS: The AUC values of ACR score, ACR TI-RADS and Kwak TI-RADS for distinguishing malignant nodules from benign nodules were 0.914 (95%CI: 0.886–0.937), 0.871 (95%CI: 0.839–0.899) and 0.885 (95%CI: 0.854–0.911), respectively. In distinguishing of patients with MTC from PTC, the AUC values of ACR score, ACR TI-RADS and Kwak TI-RADS were 0.650 (95%CI: 0.565–0.734), 0.596 (95%CI: 0.527–0.664), and 0.613 (95%CI: 0.545–0.681), respectively. The AUC values of ACR score, ACR TI-RADS and Kwak TI-RADS for the discrimination of patients with MTC, PTC or benign nodules from patients without MTC, PTC or benign nodules were 0.899 (95%CI: 0.882–0.915), 0.865 (95%CI: 0.846–0.885), and 0.873 (95%CI: 0.854–0.893), respectively. CONCLUSION: The ACR score performed the best, followed ex aequo by the ACR and Kwak TI-RADS in discriminating patients with malignant nodules from benign nodules and patients with MTC from PTC. SUPPLEMENTARY INFORMATION: The online version contains supplementary material available at 10.1186/s12902-022-01053-z.