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It is my understanding that less than 3% of cats who undergo this
treatment have any negative side effects. I guess anything can
happen, but the radiation therapy is widely accepted as the
very best option of the two cures, the other being surgery.
Cost is the only sound deterrent.

We were told that it is highly unlikely that a cat can go
*hypo*thyroid after radiation.

A good facility will offer a free top up dosage if the initial one
wasn't adequate.

-mhd

My 17-year-old Gideon had thyroid surgery on Tuesday.  He was not a
good candidate for radiation, because his thyroid was hugely enlarged.
My vet said that the lobe that was removed was almost as big as her
thumb, and the size she showed me as what it's supposed to be is
as small as a peppercorn or less.

The vet and I thought it better to do surgery and have the tissue
analyzed, in case it was thyroid cancer.  The lab report came back
yesterday that it wasn't cancer.  The other lobe looked perfectly
normal, although there is some chance that it could also go abnormal
in the future.

The reason it got so enlarged was my previous vet was an idiot, and
kept telling me he was losing weight from a change of diet (when the
other cat became diabetic) and didn't suggest any blood tests nor
apparently even feel his throat, before I went to another vet for
a second opinion -- after being told for the third time it was just
the low-carb diet.

He was on Tapizole for 3 weeks after he was diagnosed, to bring
down his T4 to assess his kidneys.  It was supposed to be a month,
but he started vomiting his canned food after about 2 weeks on it,
and he could only keep down babyfood strained chicken or turkey for
the 3rd week.  By the end of the third week, he started to refuse the
babyfood, too.  So we did the bloodwork, took him off the Tapizole,
and scheduled the surgery, even though his T4 wasn't all the way down.
He's going for a final blood test for kidney levels next week, just
to make sure they're not going up.

The incision in his neck is only a little longer than half an inch,
and she used dissolving stitches, so they don't have to be removed.
It almost looks like a plastic surgery close, because I can't see
the stitches.  She gave me Medicam drops for pain, which I mix with
a tablespoon of babyfood because I know he'll finish that, and might
not eat his catfood before the other cat gets to it.

He was a little woozy for an hour or so after I brought him home,
but looked around for more food after the medicated bit, so I gave
him a dollop more.  An hour or so later, he was pretty perky, and
looked around for more food, so I gave him the rest of the jar.
A couple of hours later, he started eating the other cat's canned food.

When he was awake, he purred contentedly, not the chest-heaving panting
purr as though he was in pain.  Honestly, he acted as though he hadn't
had surgery.  In the 24 hours after surgery, he ate like he was trying
to gain all his weight back in one day, and begged for food all day.
His appetite was more normal by Thurday.

He had the thyroid surgery along with teeth cleaning and a couple
of teeth that needed to come out.  My vet only charged me about
$325, including the fee to send the tissue to the outside lab.

I'm kind of glad that I had a good medical excuse to have the less
expensive surgery done, instead of radiation, because the fee for
radiation would have been somewhat of a hardship to pay off.  My new
vet is Cornell-trained, and teaches thyroid surgery to other vets,
so I felt very confident about her doing the surgery.