ABSTRACT
This chapter deals with endocrine tumours, focusing on thyroid cancer. It discusses epidemiology, aetiology, pathology, symptoms and signs, diagnosis and investigations, staging, treatment, surgery, and therapy, and treatment-related complications of the cancer. The most common presentation is with a painless, solitary lump in the neck. Diagnosis includes: benign tumours of thyroid, e.g. adenoma; other malignant tumours of thyroid, e.g. lymphoma and fibrosarcoma; and metastases, e.g. carcinoma of the lung, hypernephroma and melanoma. Small (<1 cm) well-differentiated tumours may be managed with local excision; other papillary or follicular cancers will require some form of thyroid ablation followed by hormone replacement therapy to prevent hypothyroidism. The chapter also briefly discusses carcinoid tumours, lymphoma, tumours of the parathyroid gland, tumours of the adrenal glands, phaeochromocytoma, and adrenal cortex tumours.
