What is radioactive iodine oblation Therapy (thyroid cells ablation with iodine 131)?
Typically, radioactive treatment is perform on thyroid cancer stage three or greater and/or in stage two in patients younger than 45.2 Radioactive Iodine oblation therapy is conducted in order to destroy all normal and abnormal thyroid cells, including cancer cells. Destroying these cells makes future body scans more accurate. It also provides more accurate blood testing which is commonly done to monitor for thyroid cancer recurrences. In order for radiation therapy to be effective an environment needs to be creating that facilitates the remaining thyroid cancer cells to uptake the radioactive iodine. The ideal environment for optimal uptake of radiation is for your body to have low levels of iodine and high levels of a hormone called TSH. To decrease the levels of iodine in one’s body, one must decrease the amount of iodine they eat. Thus, the low iodine diet for two weeks prior to the radioactive iodine treatment. This diet tends to be very annoying at times. One will find themselves
