# Revised American Thyroid Association guidelines for the management of medullary thyroid carcinoma

Source: https://onco.cc/key-papers/paper-ata-medullary-thyroid-guideline-wells-thyroid-2015/  
OnCo record `paper-ata-medullary-thyroid-guideline-wells-thyroid-2015` (Key paper). Data CC BY-NC 4.0, attribute "Data from OnCo (onco.cc)"; commercial use needs a licence.

## TL;DR

The American Thyroid Association guideline for medullary thyroid cancer sets out RET germline testing for every patient, the timing of prophylactic thyroidectomy in hereditary carriers by mutation risk, surgical extent, and systemic therapy for advanced disease.

## Summary

Comprehensive guideline covering diagnosis and genetic testing, risk categories for RET mutations (highest, high, moderate) with recommended ages for prophylactic surgery, initial surgical management, postoperative calcitonin surveillance, management of persistent or recurrent disease, external radiotherapy and kinase inhibitors.

## Fields

- Kind: Key paper
- Last checked: 2026-09-17
- Journal: Thyroid
- Year: 2015
- DOI: 10.1089/thy.2014.0335
- Authors: Wells SA, Asa SL, Dralle H, et al.
- What it means: The medullary thyroid cancer page's approach to hereditary carriers and to surgery without radioactive iodine follows this guideline.
- Caveats: Predates selpercatinib and pralsetinib; systemic therapy recommendations are outdated.

## Sources

- Thyroid 2015: https://doi.org/10.1089/thy.2014.0335
- PubMed: https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/25810047/

## Connected records

- cancers: [Medullary thyroid cancer](https://onco.cc/cancers/medullary-thyroid-cancer/)

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