Thyroidectomy without Radioiodine in Low-Risk Thyroid Cancer.

To the Editor: The trial reported by Leboulleux et al. (March 10 issue)(1) sought to compare radioactive iodine (radioiodine) ablation with observation in "low-risk" patients with differentiated thyroid cancer. Even before the 2015 American Thyroid Association guidelines formalized it,(2) the use of radioiodine ablation for patients such as those included in this trial (see the enrollment criteria; ClinicalTrials.gov number, NCT01837745) all but disappeared from U.S. practice. Since 2015, my colleagues and I have seen no such patients referred for radioiodine ablation; hence, we found the Journal article altogether superfluous. The argument that "One goal of ablation is to achieve an . . .