Numerical simulations for a metastatic papillary thyroid cancer model using RAI 131I treatment

In this work, we numerically simulated a mathematical model to study A metastatic papillary thyroid cancer (PTC) response to different periodic radioiodine 131I (RAI) treatment. Within the simulated scenarios we consider different values for the RAI efficiency ratio. Besides that, periodic treatment protocols with the same dose were considered and also with decreasing amount of doses, with a higher dose first, followed by smaller ones. Some protocols failed to decrease the number of tumor cells, where can understand as a resistance towards RAI treatment conditions by the lack of response. These failures may mean a poorly structured treatment protocol regarding the type of therapy, doses, application intervals, or any of their combinations. Notably, RAI treatment scenarios with alternating dosages presented a successful treatment response, i.e., tumor elimination. Therefore, mathematical models are essential tools in the study of cancer biology and could assist in determining the most suitable treatment protocols, including for the metastatic PTC.