Iain Ross McDougall is Professor of Radiology and Medicine and Acting Director of Nuclear Medicine Division at Stanford University Medical Center, Stanford, USA and has a continued academic and clinical interest in the etiology and management of thyroid cancer. Previously, he wrote a single author textbook, Thyroid Disease in Clinical Practice (Chapman and Hall, London, 1992) that was well reviewed in the BMJ, Lancet and New England Journal of Medicine. He has published numerous journal articles and contributed chapters to over 100 books