Talk About Testing this Thyroid Awareness Month!

Raising Awareness About Testing

January is Thyroid Awareness Month. THANC is partnering with Lilly Oncology to support biomarker testing education and resources for those living with thyroid cancer. Throughout the month please feel free to share these infographics and fact sheets with anyone who is impacted by thyroid cancer. It is our hope to inform and encourage testing which could potentially provide more accurate diagnosis and positively impact treatment decisions.

About Comprehensive Biomarker Testing

Increasingly, cancer is being approached with precision medicine methods. Biomarker testing plays an important role in ensuring that a patient gets matched to the right treatment at the right time, based on the patient’s biomarker status.

What is biomarker testing?

The best way to know if a cancer has a treatable alteration is to talk to a doctor about getting tested for all treatable biomarkers. Next-generation sequence (NGS) testing is a method to look at multiple genes in a tumor sample all at the same time to test for genomic biomarkers.

How are biomarker tests conducted for patients with cancer?

Certain biomarker tests require a doctor to biopsy the tumor, which means removing some tissue or blood for testing. Some biopsies are surgical, may require sedation, and come with a risk of infection. A doctor will select the right type of biopsy for your tumor.

Why is it important to test for all treatable biomarkers?

It is important for patients to speak with a doctor about testing for all treatable biomarkers. Knowing what is driving a certain type of cancer may help in the selection of a treatment.

When is biomarker testing appropriate?

• When the doctors suspect cancer and have recommended a biopsy.
• When a patient is already diagnosed with cancer.
• When a patient’s cancer recurs (comes back) after treatment.