Dr. Lorch on the Treatment of Medullary Thyroid Cancer

Jochen H. Lorch, MD, director, Thyroid Cancer Center, Dana-Farber Cancer Institute, assistant professor of Medicine, Harvard Medical School, discusses the current treatment landscape of medullary thyroid cancer.

Less than 4% of all thyroid cancers are medullary thyroid cancer. Although many cases of this disease are stable and do not require treatment for many years, eventually patients can enter into an accelerated phase which requires systemic treatment, Lorch says.

Currently, there are 2 FDA-approved drugs for medullary thyroid cancer that progresses beyond the initial treatment of surgery and surveillance, vandetanib (Caprelsa) and cabozantinib (Cometriq).