My mom was diagnosed with Thyroid Cancer. I've tried to research it but the websites aren't clear.?

can someone break it down THOROUGHLY in layman's terms.

My mom was diagnosed with Thyroid Cancer. I've tried to research it but the websites aren't clear.?
First off and foremost let me express some heart felt sympathy for you and your family. This has got to be tough on everyone right now. The good news is that this cancer can be one of the easiest to treat with minimal risk of the cancer spreading to other places in the body, if it is detected (caught) early enough.


The thyroid is a big lump of tissue called a gland. It sits right near the middle of your neck, in the front, under your skin but overlying your throat. The tissue pumps out or secretes hormones. Not estrogen, but different hormones that control heart rate, blood pressure, and calcium levels in your body. Since it effects the heart rate it effects metabolism. Fast heart rates burn off calories so hyperactivite thyroid (over active like a "hyper" kid) would cause weight loss and slow or hypoactive thyroid would cause weight gain. Calcium levels can fluctuate or go up and down based on one of the hormones it releases regardless of how much milk, cheese, etc. The thyroid controls how much calcium stays in the body and how much you "pee" out.


Cancer is caused by irritation of tissues over a long period of time. Thyroid cancers are most commonly caused by a lot of exposure to radiation - this can be from cigarettes. Also having a family history can cause genetics to play a role. In the United States, women are almost three times more likely than men to develop thyroid cancer. Most people with thyroid cancer are more than 45 years old.


Iodine is a substance found in shellfish and iodized salt. Scientists are studying abnormal iodine levels as a possible risk factor for thyroid cancer. More studies are needed to know whether iodine is a risk factor for sure at this point. Iodine is added to salt to prevent the formation of a super-sized thyroid which is also called a "goiter"





Treatment for thyroid cancer includes surgical removal of the thyroid tissue (gland) by way of a 3 to 4 inch incision in the neck just below the middle of the front of your neck (where a turtle-neck sweater would go).





IF SHE HAS SURGERY - This surgery is short - maybe about 30 minutes in the operating room. Add one hour or two for preparation and recovery times. Then your mom will spend the night to keep an eye on her blood pressure and her blood (body) calcium levels. Since calcium also effects how well the muscles react, if she has any muscle cramps of her hands, arm, or legs during her stay she should tell the nurse. She will have to take calcium pills after surgery and they will do what will seem like a LOT of blood tests but it's to check her calcium levels. Have her ask for throat spray or lozenges for her sore throat because it will hurt a bit to swallow the pills. Ice packs to the throat for 20 minutes at a time will help with swelling of the site.





Your mom's doctor will decide if due to the "staging" she will benefit from radiation therapy. Staging means how advanced the cancer was in it's development - how long after the cancer started was it discovered by a physician and if it could have spread at all to other nearby tissues. Lower stages of development are better so a stage 1 or 2 would be better than a stage 4. Stage 4 means the cancer shows signs of "metastisis" or spreading to other areas of the body.


Other treatments - Radiation therapy from a machine would be given to the neck specifically. Chemotherapy (medicine through an IV in her arm or chest) or radioactive iodine is given if the cancer could have spread anywhere else through the blood or lymph fluid (which is like blood in that it circulates through the whole body through a "tubular" system much like blood vessels or veins). This would treat the whole body instead of just the neck or a "local" treatment for the cancer.





If her thyroid gland is surgically removed, your mom will need to take medication to act as her new thyroid. The hormone pills will replace what used to be sent out from the tissue. She will probably have to get her calcium levels checked and will take calcium supplements (vitamins). She will need to take this the rest of her life. Which I hope will be a long, long, time. : )
Reply:If your mother has one of the most common types of thyroid cancer, papillary or follicular, her outlook is very (very) good. Usually curable. I had papillary cancer at the age of 33, and 2 years later feel completely fine.





The treatment includes surgery to remove the thyroid and then radioactive iodine. Your thyroid is one of the only parts of the body that absorbs iodine so if you make the iodine radioactive any remaining thyroid tissue (from after the surgery) will absorb it and die off.





Radioactive iodine is a pill you swallow. You need to limit your contact with other people for several days (b/c you're radioactive!), but other than that I didn't experience any side effects.





Traditional radiation therapy or chemo is almost never used.





After the initial treatment your mom will continued to be monitored for the rest of her life to make sure it doesn't come back. I go to the doctors every six months or so for simple blood tests, and every year I have a body scan (basically a giant xray).





Cancer is a very scary word, but chances are your mom will be just fine. Hang in there.
Reply:Thyroid cancer recovery rates are close to 100%...the worst case scenario is probably complete removal of the thyroid, which just means mom will have to take a pill every day to replace its function.





Best wishes to Mom!
Reply:My sister was diagnosed with thyroid cancer a year or so ago. They removed her thyroid and she is fine. The doctor told her that if you had to get cancer, cancer of the thyroid is the best place to get it because it is the most curable. Good luck.
Reply:a little advice ,all cancers are anarobic all off them which means they are all basically caused by the same thing ,lack of oxygen in the body ,started by a mineral defficientcy not a chemo therapy defficientcy. look up otto warberg on the internet and youll start to understand,then get a copy of dead doctors dont lie by dr joel wallach immediately things will change.good luck
Reply:This is the explanation (the patient version) for thyroid cancer, from the National Cancer Institute:


http://www.cancer.gov/cancertopics/pdq/t...





it's organized in sections and it covers all info -including stages, tratement.





I hope your mom will get well soon; until then, be strong, patient and never lose hope and faith! God can help her.
Reply:The thyroid gland is located in your neck, right where your neck and jaw meet. Thyroid cancer starts out with abnormal growth of the tissues. At first, all of the cancer cells are contained inside the thyroid gland, and the cancer is easily cured by removing all or part of the gland. If the cancer grows for a long enough time, it can start to spread to nearby areas in the throat, or travel to other parts of the body through the blood stream. Wherever the cancer cells end up, they replace the normal cells and whatever functions were provided by the normal cells are lost. Health problems develop when an organ can't do its job because of the cancer.





Cancer treatment involves killing the cancer cells, while trying not to kill the healthy cells. This is very easy to do when the cancer is isolated to a small area, and it becomes increasingly difficult as the cancer spreads. Small areas of cancer can be treated with surgery or a beam of radiation; cancer spread over large ares requires chemo therapy.





The good thing about thyroid cancer is that people are so sensitive to changes in the thyroid that the cancer is usually caught before it spreads, so it is usually easy to treat.
Reply:The good news...Most thyroid cancers are curable. Check out this link. It also list the different types of thyroid cancer. Let me know if you have any specific questions or call a professional in your area.





http://www.endocrineweb.com/thyroidca.ht...
Reply:All cancers are able to be cured the thing is, to make sure that we get to them on time, timing is very important and of the essense when dealing with cancers.