Questions for Patients and Doctors

Thyroid Surgery

The Treatment

While your doctor will discuss treatment options with you in detail, generally, treatments include:  surgery, radioactive iodine treatment, thyroid hormone therapy, external beam radiation, or chemotherapy.1 Treatment plans often use two or more of these options, but surgery is the main treatment for all thyroid cancers.1

If you have a cancerous or potentially cancerous lesion, your doctor will most likely perform a thyroidectomy - removal of the thyroid gland. The size and location of the nodule will determine whether a thyroidectomy or thyroid lobectomy - removal of only part of the thyroid - is the best option.

For cancers smaller than 1 cm (½ inch) that show no signs of spreading, surgeons may remove only the affected side.1 When cancer has spread outside the thyroid, surgery is also used to remove nearby lymph nodes. The two traditional surgical options for thyroid cancer are open and endoscopic surgery. Open surgery is considered effective but requires a 3.5 - 8 cm (1.4 - 3 inches) or larger incision in the neck, which can leave a visible scar.2,3 Also, the view into deeper structures of the neck containing delicate nerves is limited.4 Endoscopic thyroidectomy is minimally invasive and may be effective for selected patients, but it can also leave visible scaring; multiple, smaller incisions are used, with the largest being 1.5 - 3 cm (.6 - 1.2 inches).2,3

One of the potential complications of thyroid surgery is voice change. Also, if most or all of your thyroid gland is removed, you will need to take daily thyroid hormone medication.5

A New Category in Minimally Invasive Surgery

Thanks to the latest evolution in surgical technology, physicians now have an effective alternative to traditional open surgery and laparoscopy that allows them to provide patients with the best of both approaches. With the assistance of the da Vinci Surgical System, surgeons can now operate using only 1-2 cm incisions, but with greater precision and control than ever before.

Learn More

To learn more about da Vinci thyroidectomy utilizing the da Vinci Surgical System, click here.

  1. American Cancer Society. Thyroid Cancer. www.cancer.org.
  2. Ruggieri M, Straniero A, Mascaro A, et al. The minimally invasive open video-assisted approach in surgical thyroid diseases. BMC Surg. 2005 Published online 2005 April 27. doi: 10.1186/1471-2482-5-9.
  3. Brunaud L et al. Incision Length for Standard Thyroidectomy and Parathyroidectomy When Is It Minimally Invasive? Arch Surg. 2003;138:1140-1143.
  4. Robotic Thyroidectomy. A new option for thyroid surgery that doesn’t leave a neck scar. www.EndocrineWeb.com.
  5. American Thyroid Association. Thyroid Surgery. www.thyroid.org

While clinical studies support the effectiveness of the da Vinci System when used in minimally invasive surgery, individual results may vary. Surgery with the da Vinci Surgical System may not be appropriate for every individual. Always ask your doctor about all treatment options, as well as their risks and benefits.

For additional information on minimally invasive surgery with the da Vinci Surgical System visit www.davincisurgery.com