Thyroid cancer: How to detect and treat

Thyroid cancer is easy to detect at an early stage, immediately check if there are abnormalities in the neck such as strange tumor, neck lymph nodes, feeling of choking .

Early detection of thyroid cancer

Thyroid cancer accounts for 1% of all cancers. The survival rate of the disease depends on the stage of the cancer, the malignancy of the tumor cell, the age of the patient.

In recent years with the development of diagnostic ultrasound, early detection of thyroid cancer is increasingly easy. There are cases of detecting the disease with tumors less than 5 mm. Good early-stage differentiation of thyroid cancer is highly curing. Therefore, it is important to detect thyroid cancer at an early stage because it increases the cure rate and limits the sequelae, complications of surgical treatment, radiation therapy.

Picture 1 of Thyroid cancer: How to detect and treat
Thyroid cancer if detected early can be cured.(Artwork: 115).

How to detect thyroid cancer early

  1. Patients need to see a doctor immediately if they detect abnormalities in the neck such as tumors in the neck, lymph nodes, choking in the neck .
  2. When a goiter is detected by an ultrasound, a physical examination, the patient needs to be examined immediately at the oncologist or endocrinologist to determine if it is thyroid cancer.

Diagnosis of thyroid cancer

'Armor grain' is a tumor in the thyroid that is palpable or only detected by an ultrasound of the thyroid gland with a normal image of the normal thyroid tissue. In order to detect the 'armor' , the doctor examines and evaluates the properties of these thyroid particles, specifically whether or not the neck nodes are attached, exploiting the history and progress of the disease.

After that, the patient was assigned an ultrasound of the thyroid color to assess the nature and quantity of the "armor " and detect abnormal neck nodes. If an ultrasound is detected if one or more 'thyroid beads ' are likely to develop thyroid cancer, the rate is 4-6.5%.

Next to classify the cause groups, patients are given blood for testing to measure TSH levels. Finally, patients need to do a 'small needle aspiration' test (FNA) to confirm the diagnosis of thyroid cancer.

How to implement FNA

Under the guidance of ultrasound, the doctor uses a syringe attached to a very small long needle that sucks the cells from the tumor and spreads the cells on a glass plate to observe under a microscope.FNA's diagnostic capacity is 95% accurate if enough samples are taken and an experienced surgeon is available.

FNA is indicated for all cases of 'thyroid' palpable palpation through examination , 'armor ' is 1 cm or more in size via ultrasound. If the armor size is less than 1 cm detected by ultrasound, only FNA will be performed when there are malignant suspicions through ultrasound images such as poor echo, solid, calcified, uneven shore . Not indicated FNA in case blood levels of TSH decrease and thyroid scintigraphy is hot.

Picture 2 of Thyroid cancer: How to detect and treat
Artwork pokes cells with small needles

Subjects with 'thyroid' have a high rate of thyroid cancer that is younger than 30 or greater than 60; had irradiated the head area earlier; There are people with thyroid cancer in the family.

Treatment of thyroid cancer

When the FNA result concludes that cancer or cancer is suspected, the patient will be scheduled for treatment including surgery to remove the thyroid gland. Treatment of thyroid cancer is a multi-modal treatment, ie, it is necessary to coordinate several treatments together for optimal results such as:

  1. Thyroidectomy according to the principle of oncology, with or without curettage of the neck.
  2. Radiation therapy with radioactive iodine: Put radioactive isotope 131 into the body to destroy residual cancer cells.
  3. Endocrine therapy for years to suppress the remaining cancer cells to help reduce the rate of relapse or slow down the recurrence time.

Depending on the size of the tumor, the type of histology, the status of the neck lymph node metastasis . but the method of surgery, postoperative endocrine therapy on each patient is different, indicating the use of radioactive iodine is also different. .

After surgery and radioactive iodine treatment, the patient has a long-term and strict endocrine treatment regimen to reduce the recurrence rate to the lowest level and bring the patient back to life with strength. strong like a normal person.