Thyroid Cancer - Other Treatment
If your thyroid cancer comes back (recurs), you may need radiation therapy to the neck. Radiation therapy is used if radioactive iodine has not worked. It may also be used if you are not healthy enough to have surgery, if your cancer could not be entirely removed during surgery, or if your cancer has spread to your bones.
What to think about
Your doctor may also put you on a low-iodine diet before your treatment. If you are on a low-iodine diet, you cannot eat foods that contain a lot of iodine, such as seafood and baked goods. Depleting your body of iodine may make radioactive iodine treatment more effective because your cells become "hungry" for iodine.
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- Foods to avoid in a low-iodine diet include milk and other dairy products, commercial baked products (including most breads), seafood, and red food dye #3. A low-iodine diet is not the same as a low-salt diet. Most salt in the United States and Canada has iodine added, so low-iodine diets avoid iodized salt, but non-iodized salt is okay to eat.
- For more information, talk to your doctor or a registered dietitian, or visit the Thyroid Cancer Survivor's Association Web site at www.thyca.org/rai.htm.
The decision to use radiation therapy to treat thyroid cancer that has come back depends on the type of thyroid cancer you have, whether the cancer responds to radioactive iodine, what previous treatments were used, and your general health.
Clinical trials continue to evaluate the best treatments for thyroid cancer. Talk with your doctor about clinical trials in your area. Information about ongoing clinical trials is also available from the National Cancer Institute. For more information, see the Other Places to Get Help section of this topic.
WebMD Medical Reference from Healthwise
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