Many factors influence the chance that you may experience a return or relapse of thyroid cancer. New data suggest that age alone appears to be an independent risk factor for predicting whether differentiated thyroid cancer, the most common kind, will reoccur,1 according to study findings published in the journal, Thyroid. That said, it’s important to understand that it’s not definite that the thyroid cancer will return, just an increased likelihood. Other factors, such as the stage of the cancer at diagnosis, still play a role—and the stage at diagnosis may soften the effects of increasing age,1 the researchers report.This finding is not surprising, says Victor J. Bernet, MD, chair of the division of endocrinology and associate professor of medicine at Mayo Clinic College of Medicine in Jacksonville, Florida, as well as president-elect of the American Thyroid Association.