Key clinical point: Thyroid cancer rates are on the rise in U.S. pediatric patients, and researchers say the trend can’t entirely be explained as overdiagnosis because increases were seen in both small/early-stage and large/late-stage tumors.

Major finding: The rate of pediatric differentiated thyroid cancers (DTCs) increased significantly by 4.43% per year, with significant increases found in both localized and more aggressive tumors, as well as in both smaller and larger tumors.

Study details: Retrospective analysis including 7,296 primary DTCs in children aged 0-19 years from the North American Association of Central Cancer Registries between 1998 and 2013.

Disclosures: The research was supported by the Intramural Research Program of the National Cancer Institute. Dr. Shiels and coauthors made no conflict of interest disclosures related to their report.