Anaplastic thyroid carcinoma: A therapeutic challenge

Anaplastic thyroid carcinoma is an extremely aggressive solid tumor that re sists most therapeutic efforts and is almost always fatal. It typically ari ses as a terminal dedifferentiation of unrecognized long-standing different iated thyroid carcinoma. Current chemotherapeutic agents are not capable of consistent beneficial therapeutic responses, although rare patients may ga in additional months of survival. Aggressive local tumor control with surge ry and external beam radiotherapy may provide palliation and delay eventual death from distant metastatic disease. This disease challenges clinicians and researchers to develop new systemic therapies as well as to aggressivel y treat differentiated thyroid cancers before they become anaplastic tumors . Published 1999 by Wiley-Liss, Inc.dagger.