|
 OTHER NAMES
- Thyroid gland tumor.
- Thyroid gland adenoma.
- Thyroid gland carcinoma.
DEFINITION
The thyroid nodule is a bundle ó mass that can be called a tumor placed in the thyroid gland, that it is possible to explore in the previous part of the neck
CAUSES OF THE THYROID NODULES
|
|
The thyroid nodules are bundles to the exploration of the thyroid gland and it usually corresponds to accumulations of thyroid cells with or without liquid in his interior (cyst) that they form a nodule that can be benign or malignant depending on other variables.
The thyroid nodules are quite frequent in the adult population (more than 5 %) and especially in the women. In persons older than 60 years they appear almost in half of the cases.
Of all the nodules only 3,5 % can be considered to be malignant or cancerous.
There are a few risk factors to suppose that a thyroid nodule could be cancerous:
- To be a man younger than 20 years or major than 70.
- Familiar precedents of cancer of thyroid gland.
- Familiar precedents of other cancers.
- The hard nodules.
- A nodule fixed to nearby structures.
- Appearance of palsy of the vocal cords.
- Precedents of having been exhibited to a radiation in head and neck.
Sometimes we can find a concrete cause of his appearance as it can be in the shortcoming of iodine, the inhibition of the thyroid hormone, or in the Hashimoto tiroiditis.
|
SIGNS AND SYMPTOMS
Most of the thyroid nodules are small and they do not produce symptoms being a chance find in a medical routine exploration.
In other occasions they can be big and press the adjacent textiles and producing hence:
- Make respiratory (shortness of breath) difficult
- Make difficult for deglutir (disfagia)
- Hoarseness or change of the voice (agonies or disfonías)
- Pain in the neck
- Goiter or increase of the thyroid gland to simple sight in the neck.
If the nodules produce excess of thyroid gland hipertiroidismo symptoms will appear:
- Loss of weight, showy slimming
- Increase of the appetite
- Nervousness
- Worry
- Pulse altered with tachycardia
- Increase of the intestinal rhythm
- Sticky and cold skin
- Heat and intolerance to the heat.
When the thyroid nodules take place for the Hashimoto illness an absence of thyroid hormone takes place on the contrary, giving symptoms of:
- Intolerance to the cold.
- Fatigue, weariness.
- Skin dries.
- Loss of the hair.
- Increase of exaggerated weight.
- Facial edema.
DIAGNOSIS
Since there have been said previously most of the thyroid nodules they are small and they do not produce symptoms being a chance find in a medical routine exploration. When a nodule is felt the doctor will ask for a few complementary explorations to do a diagnosis of the cause of the same one.
- Levels of T3 and T4
- Levels of the stimulant hormone of the thyroid gland (TSH)
- Ultrasound scan of the thyroid gland
- Biopsy for aspiration with thin needle
- Gammagrafía of the thyroid gland; in her two types of nodules differ:
- The warm (functional ones) that turn out to be dark in the gammagrafía. Only 1 % of the functional nodules is cancerous to them.
- The cold or clear nodules (not functional) in the gammagrafía, between them 20 % is cancerous.
TREATMENT
Many of the nodules disappear without a causal diagnosis. Of those who persist a surgery is recommended in case of:
Be cancerous in the realized explorations Cause symptoms for his size in the surrounding textiles (disfagia, shortness of breath, aphonias, etc...) When the diagnosis in contradictory.
The patients with warm or functional nodules can be treated by radioactive iodine that reduces his size, but as it is not mathematical it can stay with a high or low function after this treatment.
Later it is added, if this happens, of medical treatment of for life with thyroid hormone (if it has stayed hipotiroidismo) or levotiroxina (Levotroid) that is a medicine that inhibits the production of the thyroid hormone T4.
Before an asymptomatic and benign nodule a pursuit is recommended with ultrasound scan and biopsy every 6 or 12 months.
There are more current treatments with injection of alcohol or with laser for the treatment of these nodules.
WHAT DOCTOR CAN TREAT ME?
|
DENOMINATION 
