gms | German Medical Science

86th Annual Meeting of the German Society of Oto-Rhino-Laryngology, Head and Neck Surgery

German Society of Oto-Rhino-Laryngology, Head and Neck Surgery

13.05. - 16.05.2015, Berlin

Thyroid Surgery by the ENT-Specialist?

Meeting Abstract

  • corresponding author presenting/speaker Peter Rolf Issing - ENT-Department, Bad Hersfeld, Germany
  • Hendrik Tebben - ENT-Department, Bad Hersfeld, Germany
  • Martin Wenger - Department for Nuclerar Medicine, Bad Hersfeld, Germany
  • Thorsten Köhler - ENT-Department, Bad Hersfeld, Germany

German Society of Oto-Rhino-Laryngology, Head and Neck Surgery. 86th Annual Meeting of the German Society of Oto-Rhino-Laryngology, Head and Neck Surgery. Berlin, 13.-16.05.2015. Düsseldorf: German Medical Science GMS Publishing House; 2015. Doc15hno04

doi: 10.3205/15hno04, urn:nbn:de:0183-15hno040

Published: August 10, 2015

© 2015 Issing et al.
This is an Open Access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 License. See license information at http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/.


Outline

Text

Introduction: Although the thyroid gland is located in the neck it is not a matter of fact that it is a clinical issue for the otorhinolaryngologist in Germany. Probably due to historic reasons general surgeons usually perform operations on the thyroid. As at our department this kind of treatment is an established procedure we prospectively evaluated our thyroid cases in order to present our results.

Material and Methods: The prospective study at the Department of Otorhinolaryngology, Head and Neck Surgery Bad Hersfeld started in the year of 2014. So far 150 patients were enrolled with an average age of 54.7 years (16–89). The sex ratio showed a significant preponderance of the female patients with 112 and 38 males. In 99 case we didn’t insert a Redon-drainage. The mean operation time was 133 minutes. The preoperative concentration of calcium was 2.43 mg/ml with a postoperative decrease to 2.20 mg/ml. In cases of malignancies revealed in histology a second procedure with complete thyroidectomy and neck dissection took place immediately afterwards.

Conclusions: Many symptoms of disorders of the thyroid become manifest in a genuine region of our speciality. Therefore we cannot detect any convincing reason why head and neck surgeons should not perform thyroidectomies. Skills like the specific clinical examination, the preoperative diagnostic work flow including sonography, the precise surgical management of soft tissue and neural structures and the postoperative care are typical features of our discipline. However, besides the surgeon’s expertise a close collaboration with the colleagues of nuclear medicine and the general practitioner respectively the endocrinologist is mandatory in order to achieve a high quality of treatment.