Can we consider downsizing the radioiodine therapy dose in some patients of differentiated cancer thyroid with multiple skeletal metastasis on diagnostic iodine-131 whole-body scan with single-photon emission computed tomography-computed tomography?

Abstract

ABSTRACT It has been found that around 30% of patients of differentiated thyroid cancer with skeletal metastasis alone showed complete remission. Laboratory studies have explained a mechanism of bone metastasis where in the first premetastatic niches are formed, leading on to the formation of micrometastasis, and then on to overt metastasis. In view of the above, identifying patients who are at the micrometastatic stage can help establish a separate category of patients who would require a lower dose of radioactive iodine than those with overt metastasis. A diagnostic iodine-131 whole-body scan with single-photon emission computed tomography-computed tomography can help in identifying this category of patients.