Medical expert witnesses may consult regarding different specialty areas of medicine including surgery, anesthesiology, independent medical exams (IMEs), cancer treatment, and related topics. A medical expert at the Weill Cornell Medical College recently published an article weighing the pros and cons of using radioactive iodine ablation after partial or total thyroidectomies. Stanley Goldsmith, director of the school’s Department of Nuclear Medicine and Molecular Imaging, wrote in the journal Seminars in Nuclear Medicine that an individual approach should be taken when using the treatment, since different patients often have radically different symptoms.
In particular, Goldsmith said that low-risk patients – those who do not have an advanced form of thyroid cancer – may not require post-operative ablation at all, or only in low doses at most. That being said, he added that defining “low risk” can be problematic. Ablation with radioactive iodine involves taking one or a series of pills containing iodine-131, a radioactive isotope of the element.
Read more: endocrineweb.com.