Thyroid cancer: stages, symptoms, treatment

 Thyroid cancer (ICD - C73) is an oncological pathology in which a patient develops a malignant tumor in the thyroid gland. In this case, the disease occurs due to the formation of follicular, medullary, papillary cells in the tissues of the organ.

 

This disease is more often diagnosed among patients older than 40 years. In women, the disease is fixed 4 times more often than in the opposite sex.

 

With thyroid cancer, a person complains of difficulty swallowing, discomfort in the throat, hoarseness, weight loss, excessive sweating, and weakness.

 

It is possible to identify the disease even at the very beginning of its development. Timely therapy allows you to completely get rid of the disease.

 

Causes

 

Today, oncological disease is rare among patients, but the diagnosis is detected among all age groups. Thyroid cancer is less common in men than in women. There are cases when the disease is found in children and adolescents.

 

There are some causes of thyroid cancer:

prolonged use of thyroid-stimulating hormone in high doses;

prolonged lack of iodine;

the negative impact of ionizing radiation;

adenomas, adenomatosis in the thyroid tissue;

hereditary diseases (Carney and Cowden syndromes, familial adenomatous polyposis).

Other factors that provoke the development of cancer:

chronic diseases of the female genital organs caused by hormonal disorders;

breast tumors;

multiple endocrine neoplasia;

multinodular thyroid goiter.

 

Classification

 

It is customary to distinguish between the following types of thyroid cancer:

papillary, which is the most common among patients. The course is most often without any manifestations, metastases to other organs are usually not observed. With therapy, it is possible to completely recover from the disease;

medullary thyroid cancer, in which an aggressive course of the pathological process occurs. Metastases appear in the lymph nodes of the neck area. This variety is difficult to treat;

follicular, characterized by a malignant neoplasm in a blood vessel. This form of the disease accounts for 20-30% of all cases. Most often detected among elderly patients;

anaplastic cancer, when the symptoms develop rapidly. The type of disease is difficult to treat, this pathology has a high mortality rate.

 

Allocate these stages of thyroid cancer:

stage I, when the formation is local. There is no damage to the thyroid capsule. During this period, thyroid cancer passes without metastases;

stage IIa, when the patient is diagnosed with a single tumor that does not metastasize and does not break the organ capsule;

stage IIb, characterized by a neoplasm with unilateral metastatic lymph nodes;

stage III, in which the formation damages the thyroid capsule, compresses neighboring tissues and organs. There is damage to the lymph nodes on both sides;

stage IV, when the tumor penetrates the nearest tissues and organs. Education with metastases grows into surrounding or distant organs.

 

Symptoms

 

Usually, at the very beginning of development, the pathology proceeds without symptoms, and it is detected by chance during a preventive examination. Sometimes the patient can independently identify an increase in the cervical lymph nodes or the presence of nodes.

 

Symptoms of thyroid cancer with tumor growth:

hoarse voice;

discomfort when swallowing;

labored breathing;

tightness in the throat;

cough;

sore throat;

suffocation;

weight loss;

excessive sweating;

loss of appetite.

If the pathology is in a child, then most often it proceeds slowly, and the prognosis for treatment is positive. When the disease occurs in young people, lymphogenous metastasis of the formation is observed. Signs of thyroid cancer in the elderly are rapidly expressed and tend to aggressive malignant forms.

Diagnostics

If a person began to experience unpleasant symptoms in the neck and throat that he did not notice before, it is worth contacting a specialist. The endocrinologist is engaged in the identification and further therapy of a serious disease . If a neoplasm is suspected, the patient will be sent to an oncologist .

 

Diagnosis of thyroid cancer includes

palpation of the thyroid gland, in which the doctor can detect single or multiple nodes of dense texture, limited organ mobility and enlarged lymph nodes;

general and biochemical blood tests;

Ultrasound of the thyroid gland , which cannot always distinguish cancer from another pathology. The survey determines the size and number of nodes in the organ;

tomography, which with high accuracy determines the nature of the neoplasm and the stage of the disease;

fine-needle biopsy, which allows extracting elements of the tumor for histology;

radionuclide study, which determines the stage of the disease.

 

Treatment

 

If, during the course of the diagnosis, the specialist confirmed the oncological pathology, it is worth promptly starting therapy. Methods of dealing with thyroid cancer depend on the age of the patient, the degree and type of the disease.

 

Thyroid cancer treatment consists of:

a surgical operation involving the complete removal of an organ - subtotal and total thyroidectomy. When the pathology is in stages I-II with the localization of the formation in one lobe, then it is removed along with the isthmus and areas of the other lobe that are damaged. Intervention with the removal of the neck muscles, excision of the jugular vein, regional lymph nodes and fatty subcutaneous tissue is carried out for patients at stages III-IV;

radioiodine therapy, which is prescribed in combination with surgery. Radioactive iodine therapy causes the destruction of thyroid cancer metastases and tissue remnants after the intervention. The procedure is especially effective for metastases of thyroid cancer in the lungs;

antitumor therapy, including external irradiation. Apply manipulation with metastases. Radiation and chemotherapy are indicated for the palliative treatment of advanced oncological pathology.

 

After a surgical operation, scheduled examinations are carried out to assess the dynamics, exclude relapses and metastases. The patient is given x-ray of the lungs , ultrasound of the thyroid gland, scintigraphy. After the surgical intervention, the patient needs to take thyroxine for a stable TSH level within the lower limit.