Clinical Thyroidology for Patients is a collection of summaries of recently published articles from the medical literature that covers the broad spectrum of thyroid disorders.
Starting with the May 2009 issue, Clinical Thyroidology for Patients will be published on a monthly basis and include summaries of research studies that were discussed in the previous month’s issue of Clinical Thyroidology, a publication of the American Thyroid Association for physicians. Dr. Mazzaferri is the Editor-in-Chief of Clinical
Thyroidology.
May 2009 Volume 2 Issue 1
Now available in pdf format for saving and printing and Web page format for viewing online
PDF Format for Saving and Printing
Clinical Thyroidology for Patients May 2009 Volume 2 Issue 1 (PDF file, 262 KB)
TABLE OF CONTENTS – Web Format
THYROID HORMONE Hypothyroidism is very common and is treated with thyroid hormone pills, usually in the form of Levothyroxine. In several large population studies, it has been shown that many patients are on too high or too low a dose. In particular, elderly patients are more likely to have a problem if they are over- or under-treated. This study was done to find out how common over- and under-treatment is in elderly hypothyroid patients and what factors may cause this problem.
Somwaru LL, Arnold AM, Joshi N, Fried LP, Cappola AR. High frequency of and factors associated with thyroid hormone over-replacement and under-replacement in men and women aged 65 and over. J Clin Endocrinol Metab 2009;94:1342-5.
(PDF File for saving and printing, 73 KB)
THYROID CANCER There has been a rapid increase in the number of new cases of thyroid cancer over the last 30 years. Most thyroid cancers occur in women and currently thyroid cancer is the 6th most common cancer in women. With the increased use of imaging and biopsy studies, smaller thyroid cancers can be found. This study was done to determine if the increase in new cases of thyroid cancer was due to finding more of these small thyroid cancers or due to an overall increase in all thyroid cancers.
Enewold L, Zhu K, Ron E, Marrogi AJ, Stojadinovic A, Peoples GE, Devesa SS. Rising thyroid cancer incidence in the United States by demographic and tumor characteristics, 1980-2005. Cancer Epidemiol Biomarkers Prev 2009;18:784-91.
(PDF File for saving and printing, 70 KB)
THYROID CANCER Patients with thyroid cancer are often treated with radioactive iodine (I-131) after surgery to destroy any normal and /or cancerous thyroid tissue that may be left in the neck. This study looked at how well several different doses of radioactive iodine destroyed this thyroid tissue remaining in the neck.
Kusacic Kuna S, Samardzic T, Testic V, Medvedec M, Kuna K, Bracic I, Despot M, Dodic, D. Thyroid remnant ablation in patients with papillary cancer: a comparison of low, moderate, and high activities of radioiodine. Nucl Med Commun 2009;30:263-9.
(PDF File for saving and printing, 70 KB)
HYPOTHYROIDISM There appears to be a link between breast cancer, hypothyroidism and thyroid cancer. This may be due to the radiation treatments for breast cancer. This study looked at how many patients treated for breast cancer also developed hypothyroidism. It also looked at whether having radiation therapy as a treatment for breast cancer increased a patient’s risk for developing hypothyroidism.
Reinertsen KV, Cvancarova M, Wist E, Bjoro T, Dahl AA, Danielsen T, Fossa SD. thyroid function in women after multimodal treatment for breast cancer stage II/III: comparison with controls from a population sample. Int J Radiat Oncol Biol Phys 2009.
(PDF File for saving and printing, 75 KB)
THYROID CANCER There are two main types of thyroid cancer: Papillary thyroid cancer and Follicular thyroid cancer. It has long been known that more people died if they had Follicular thyroid cancer than if they had Papillary thyroid cancer. This study is trying to find if this was because the follicular cancer was a worse cancer or if there are other reasons for this difference.
Verburg FA, Macier U, Luster M, Reiners C. Histology does not influence prognosis in differentiated thyroid carcinoma when accounting for age, tumor diameter, invasive growth and metastasis. Eur J Endocrinol 2009;160:619-24.
(PDF File for saving and printing, 70 KB)
Patient Education
Patient Publications
Connect with Us
AMERICAN THYROID ASSOCIATION® , ATA® , THYROID® , CLINICAL THYROIDOLOGY® , and the distinctive circular logo are registered in the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office as trademarks of the American Thyroid Association® , Inc.