Common treatments for thyroid cancer
by Groshan Fabiola
Even though thyroid cancer is a disease that cannot be prevented, it is a curable affection and can be treated by using an appropriate treatment. In addition, treatments of thyroid cancer usually include surgeries, radioactive iodine and radiation therapy and depend on the stage and the type of cancers.
To begin with, a common method used in patients with papillary, follicular or medullary is radiation therapy,
a procedure which is used if the patient has a risk of recurrence following surgery alone, such as the type of cancer known as Tall Cell Variant. Moreover this procedure is used when the tyroid cancer is adherent to the trachea, has mediastinal lymp node involvment or doesn't take up RAI. It is important to note that radiation therapy has brought significant results especially for the severe types of thyroid cancer and also for the patients who still present residual cancer after the surgery. Secondly, even though radiation therapy is considered a efficient method, surgery is still the most common procedure in the treatments for tyroid cancers. Unlike the partial surgeries, such as the removal of a single lobe of the thyroid gland (lobectomy), an extensive surgery which includes the whole removal of the thyroid gland thyroidectomy (only small remnant of throid tissue with parathyroid glands remain attached to the thyroid). It is important to mention that in many cases when the thyroid gland is not completely removed, the tumor may appear again.
Futhermore, in the cases of severe thyroid cancer, patients may need another treatment after they passed through a surgery. One of the most common procedure is the supplemental thyroid hormone, hormones which replace the ones produced by the thyroid. Patients who already suffered a surgery tend to become hypothyroid and in this way they need extra thyroid hormones in order to keep the remaining thyroid gland inactive through a feedback system.
Much more, another procedure used in the thyroid cancer treatments is the use of radiation iodine (RAI). This procedure is usually used for patients who suffer from tumors with high risk features such as sizes of 1.5cm, tumors which have spread to other tissues and lymph nodes and also thyroid cancer that has come back. What is more, a usual treatment used in many types of cancers and sometimes in tyroid cancer is chemotherapy. In addition certain chemotherapy drugs such as adriamycin, etoposide or cisplatin are usually used in patients who suffer from anaplastic thyroid cancer or affections which occured due to the prolonged exposure to RAI or radiation therapy.
All in all, treatments for thyroid cancer vary from a person to other and even though this type of cancer is curable, specialiasts still try to find new procedure for certain patients that don't respond to conventional therapy or patients with poor prognosis analastic disease.
About the Author
For more information about thyroid cancer or about thyroid symptoms please visit this website http://www.thyroid-info-center.com/