Breast Cancer and Thyroid Cancer

I am 40 yrs. old and was diagnosed with thyroid cancer in Aug 2006 with treatment being thyroidectomy and radioactive iodine treatment.  In December I was diagnosed with Stage 1 Invasive Ductal Breast Cancer (I can't remember the rest of the information on the diagnosis).  I am scheduled for a lumpectomy next Friday with at this point 6 weeks of daily radiation unless there is cancer in my lymph nodes.  There is no history of thyroid or breast cancer in my family.  Just curious if there are others on this board who have had thyroid and breast cancer.  I am being tested for Cowden's syndrome but from what I understand it is a very rare condition.  If anyone has read anything about links between thyroid and breast cancer I would be interested in reading that information.

Hi Terriet,

I'm curious - do you also have fibromyalgia?

There actually quite a few phycisians and researchers who have questioned and found links between thyroid problems and breast cancer, and fibromyalgia figures in there, too.  There seems to be a hormonal link between the three - it may indeed be more than just hormones, even to the point of being a problem with metabolism that predisposes to immune system problems also.

I don't have any of those web links to hand, and I'm not sure I still have them on file, but I will try to remember to take some time and look for them.  I believe I also have some information in several books - if I can find that I'll pass it along.

Sincerely,

Tre

I'm sorry - I signed off before I meant to.

I hope everything goes well with your surgery and subsequent therapy.

Please keep in touch - let us know how you are doing.

Tre

http://thyroid.about.com/cs/cancer/a/breastcancer.htm http://www.breastcancer.org/risk/new_research/20080312b.jsp http://seer.cancer.gov/publications/mpmono/Ch15_Thyroid.pdf You might find these interesting. The first is a 2000 article that refers to a medical journal article that you can order from your local library (as I recall, the title is slightly different than what is stated in this article). The second and third are more recent and the third is actually from the NIH. I, too, am being treated for breast cancer after having been treated for thyroid cancer many years ago. I got lax about my mammograms - my own fault. But had someone warned me of the risk, I would have bee n more dilegent. I brought this info to my doctors - they didn't know about it. Good luck!

On 1/23/2009 Terriet wrote:

I am 40 yrs. old and was diagnosed with thyroid cancer in Aug 2006 with treatment being thyroidectomy and radioactive iodine treatment.  In December I was diagnosed with Stage 1 Invasive Ductal Breast Cancer (I can't remember the rest of the information on the diagnosis).  I am scheduled for a lumpectomy next Friday with at this point 6 weeks of daily radiation unless there is cancer in my lymph nodes.  There is no history of thyroid or breast cancer in my family.  Just curious if there are others on this board who have had thyroid and breast cancer.  I am being tested for Cowden's syndrome but from what I understand it is a very rare condition.  If anyone has read anything about links between thyroid and breast cancer I would be interested in reading that information.

Thanks for the links to the articles. I will need some time to read them. I was diagnosed in October with hyperthyroidism and then in January with breast cancer. (it has been a busy year) I asked if there was any link but no one seemed to think the two were related.

TurtleTAM

TurtleTAM: These articles probably won't help you. They refer to the link between thyroid cancer and breast cancer with a pretty strong presumption that the link may be caused by the radioactive iodine treatment for thyroid cancer. Most of what I've seen discusses cancer rather than thyroid disorders. Good luck with both problems!

On 2/1/2009 TurtleTAM wrote:

Thanks for the links to the articles. I will need some time to read them. I was diagnosed in October with hyperthyroidism and then in January with breast cancer. (it has been a busy year) I asked if there was any link but no one seemed to think the two were related.

TurtleTAM