NEW ROCHELLE, NY -- November 6, 2009 -- The American Thyroid Association has released new, revised management guidelines for the diagnosis and treatment of patients with thyroid nodules and thyroid cancer. The new guidelines are published in the journal Thyroid.
The ATA Guidelines Taskforce updated and revised the initial management guidelines it released in 2006 because of the large number of new clinical research findings that have been published in the last 3 years.
Thyroid nodules continue to be a common clinical problem, and the prevalence of differentiated thyroid cancer is rapidly increasing.
For managing thyroid nodules, the guidelines focus on the initial presentation, clinical and ultrasound evaluation, the decision to perform fine-needle biopsy and how to interpret the results, and the management of benign thyroid nodules.
The revised guidelines for managing thyroid cancer provide recommendations for optimal surgical management, the use of radioiodine remnant ablation, thyroid hormone suppression therapy, as well as long-term surveillance based on ultrasound, other imaging modalities, and laboratory testing.
Accompanying the Management Guidelines published in Thyroid are 4 editorials that include commentary on the preparation of the revised guidelines, highlights of the 2009 revisions, the transition from consensus- to evidence-based best practices, and a surgical perspective.
"The newly revised ATA Task Force Guidelines are a worthy successor to the original guidelines published in 2006," said Charles H. Emerson, MD, University of Massachusetts School of Medicine, Worcester, Massachusetts.
"They will be carefully scrutinized by clinical investigators and used on a daily basis by physicians as they evaluate thyroid nodules and manage thyroid cancer."
SOURCE: American Thyroid Association
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