A thyroidectomy is an operation that involves the surgical removal of all or part of the thyroid gland. In general surgery, endocrine or head and neck surgeons often perform a thyroidectomy when a patient has thyroid cancer or some other condition of the thyroid gland or goiter. Other indications for surgery include cosmetic, or symptomatic obstruction. Thyroidectomy is a common surgical procedure that has several potential complications or sequelae including: temporary or permanent change in voice, temporary or permanently low calcium, need for lifelong thyroid hormone replacement, bleeding, infection, and the remote possibility of airway obstruction due to bilateral vocal cord paralysis. Complications are uncommon when the procedure is performed by an experienced surgeon.
Endocrine surgery is a surgical sub-speciality focusing on surgery of the endocrine glands, including the thyroid gland, the parathyroid glands, the adrenal glands, glands of the endocrine pancreas, and some neuroendocrine glands.
Papillary thyroid cancer is the most common type of thyroid cancer, representing 75 percent to 85 percent of all thyroid cancer cases. It occurs more frequently in women and presents in the 20–55 year age group. It is also the predominant cancer type in children with thyroid cancer, and in patients with thyroid cancer who have had previous radiation to the head and neck. It is often well-differentiated, slow-growing, and localized, although it can metastasize.
Medullary thyroid cancer is a form of thyroid carcinoma which originates from the parafollicular cells, which produce the hormone calcitonin. Medullary tumors are the third most common of all thyroid cancers and together make up about 3% of all thyroid cancer cases. MTC was first characterized in 1959.
Thyroid cancer is cancer that develops from the tissues of the thyroid gland. It is a disease in which cells grow abnormally and have the potential to spread to other parts of the body. Symptoms can include swelling or a lump in the neck. Cancer can also occur in the thyroid after spread from other locations, in which case it is not classified as thyroid cancer.
John E. Niederhuber, MD was the 13th director of the National Cancer Institute (NCI), from 2006 until July, 2010, succeeding Andrew von Eschenbach, who went on to become a director at biotechnology firm BioTime. A nationally renowned surgeon and researcher, Dr. Niederhuber has dedicated his four-decade career to the treatment and study of cancer - as a professor, cancer center director, National Cancer Advisory Board chair, external advisor to the NCI, grant reviewer, and laboratory investigator supported by NCI and the National Institutes of Health. He is now Executive Vice President/CEO Inova Translational Medicine Institute and Inova Health System and co-director, Johns Hopkins Clinical Research Network.
Henry Harrington Janeway was an American physician and pioneer of radiation therapy.
Daniel Albo is an American surgeon, medical researcher, and pioneer in minimally invasive gastrointestinal surgical oncology. He has published in areas including laparoscopic colorectal surgery and surgical oncology. He is the director of surgical oncology services and the director of health services research at the Georgia Regents University Cancer Center.
Patricia Joy Numann is an American endocrine surgeon. She is the founder of the Association of Women Surgeons, former president of the American College of Surgeons, and professor emeritus at the State University of New York Upstate Medical University.
Nadine Rena Caron FACS, FRCSC,, is a Canadian surgeon. She is the first Canadian female general surgeon of First Nations descent (Ojibway), as well as the first female First Nations student to graduate from University of British Columbia's medical school.
William G. Kaelin Jr. is an American Nobel laureate physician-scientist. He is a professor of medicine at Harvard University and the Dana–Farber Cancer Institute. His laboratory studies tumor suppressor proteins. In 2016, Kaelin received the Albert Lasker Award for Basic Medical Research and the AACR Princess Takamatsu Award. He also won the Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine in 2019 along with Peter J. Ratcliffe and Gregg L. Semenza.
Nita Ahuja is a surgeon and the Chair of the Department of Surgery at Yale School of Medicine and Surgeon-in-Chief of Surgery at Yale New Haven Hospital. She is the first woman ever to serve as Chair of Surgery in Yale in its >200 year history. Before taking this position she was the first woman ever to be the Chief of Surgical Oncology at Johns Hopkins Hospital, Baltimore, USA. Ahuja researches in the field of epigenetics and is a passionate advocate of clinician scientist. She also served as the director of Sarcoma and peritoneal surface malignancy program. She is a surgeon-scientist and her research has been cited more than 11,000 times in scientific literature.
Charis Eng is a Singapore-born physician-scientist and geneticist at the Cleveland Clinic, notable for identifying the PTEN gene. She is the Chairwoman and founding Director of the Genomic Medicine Institute of the Cleveland Clinic, founding Director and attending clinical cancer geneticist of the institute’s clinical component, the Center for Personalized Genetic Healthcare, and Professor and Vice Chairwoman of the Department of Genetics and Genome Sciences at Case Western Reserve University School of Medicine.
The American Association of Endocrine Surgeons (AAES) is a professional organization for endocrine surgeons. The organization partakes in patient care, education, and scientific investigations in the field of endocrine surgery, including training endocrine surgeons and developing practice guidelines.
Sandeep Nayak is an Indian surgical oncologist based in Bangalore, India, known as the pioneer of robotic thyroidectomy technique called RABIT and Minimally Invasive Neck Dissection. He is the founder of MACS Clinic, Bangalore. He is the Senior Director and the Head of Department of surgical oncology at Fortis Hospital, Bangalore. Nayak was recipient of the KS International Innovation Award for his technique of RIA-MIND andTimes Health Excellence Award for 2018 by The Times of India. Nayak is the member of Royal College of Surgeons of Edinburgh and American Society of Clinical Oncology. He has previously held the position of the assistant professor at Kidwai Memorial Institute of Oncology from 2012 to 2017. Nayak has been constantly ranked among the top oncologists in India
Julie Ann Freischlag is an American vascular surgeon and current CEO of Atrium Health Wake Forest Baptist. She was the first female surgeon-in-chief of The Johns Hopkins Hospital and the first female chief of vascular surgery at the University of California, Los Angeles. In 2017, Freischlag was appointed Interim Dean of Wake Forest School of Medicine and CEO of the Wake Forest Baptist Medical Center. During the COVID-19 pandemic in North America, Freischlag was named chief academic officer of Atrium Health, Inc., and appointed the President-Elect of the American College of Surgeons.
Martha A. Zeiger is an American endocrine surgeon and scientist. She is currently Director of the Center for Cancer Research Office of Surgeon-Scientist Career Development at the National Institutes of Health (NIH). She is also an adjunct investigator in the Surgical Oncology Program at NIH's National Cancer Institute, where she previously served as director. She was the S. Hurt Watts Professor and Chair of the Department of Surgery at the University of Virginia. Prior to joining academia, Zeiger spent six years in the United States Navy as General Medical Officer, Commander and Surgeon in San Diego, Hawaii and Washington, D.C.
Electron Kebebew is an American surgeon, educator, and scientist. Kebebew is currently the Harry A. Oberhelman Jr. and Mark L. Welton Professor and Chief of General Surgery at Stanford University.
Timothy Michael Pawlik is an American surgical oncologist. He is Chair of the Department of Surgery and the Urban Meyer III and Shelley Meyer Chair for Cancer Research at The Ohio State University and Surgeon-in-Chief at The Ohio State University Wexner Medical Center.
Julie Renee Brahmer is an American thoracic oncologist. She is the co-director of the Upper Aerodigestive Department within the Bloomberg~Kimmel Institute for Cancer Immunotherapy at Johns Hopkins University and the Marilyn Meyerhoff Professor in Thoracic Oncology.
