Professional Singers' Vocal Issues after Thyroid Surgery

A study out of Harvard presented the typical vocal outcomes after thyroid surgery in professional singers. No other study has ever looked at this special patient population who are the Olympic athletes of the voice. Non-singers may be completely unaware of any subtle issues with the voice after thyroid surgery . However, for professional singers, even the slightest vocal quiver could be professionally unacceptable. The main issue with thyroid surgery as it pertains to the voice is that t…

3/27/2015 1

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Actress Sofia Vergara Underwent Total Thyroidectomy for Thyroid Cancer

Actress Sofia Vergara , best known for her role in the TV hit comedy Modern Family, had her entire thyroid removed for thyroid cancer when she was 28 in 2000. This was followed by radioactive iodine therapy and now takes a daily thyroid hormone replacement for her hypothyroidism. Image by  Jenn Davis  from  Wikipedia Thyroid cancer is typically first suspected on a routine examination if a  neck mass  consistent with a  thyroid nodule  is palpated. An ultrasound of the neck is typicall…

5/04/2013 0

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New Video on Thyroid Surgery and Its Complications

A new video has been created regarding how the thyroid gland is removed along with potential complications that may occur with this surgical procedure. This video creation was a collaborative effort between myself and Dr. Henson , the general surgeon who performed the actual operation portrayed in the video. Assistance by Robin Earl and the surgical staff at Fauquier Hospital were invaluable as well. Read more about the surgery here or watch the video !

4/05/2013 3

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Miss Oregon 2013 has Thyroid Cancer

Miss Oregon Gabrielle Neilan revealed that she had thyroid cancer for which she underwent a total thyroidectomy 2 weeks before winning the Miss Oregon beauty competition on 11/25/12. [ link ] She first felt the thyroid mass in September 2012. This was soon followed by a thyroid ultrasound and a biopsy (presumably via an ultrasound guided fine needle aspiration). The biopsy came back cancerous (unclear exactly what type of thyroid cancer). Given the thyroid cancer diagnosis, she un…

1/03/2013 0

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Brooke Burke Has Thyroid Cancer

Brooke Burke , TV personality best known for winning the 7th season of Dancing with the Stars and later co-hosting the show starting in 2010 announced in a self-published video the fact that she has thyroid cancer and will soon be undergoing thyroid surgery . Apparently, on a routine physical exam, a  neck mass consistent with a thyroid nodule was appreciated in July 2012. This was biopsied (presumably via an ultrasound guided fine needle aspiration) and came back as "atypical&qu…

11/08/2012 0

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Argentine President Had Surgery for Wrongly Diagnosed Thyroid Cancer

On Jan 4, 2012, Argentine President Cristina Kirchner underwent a total thyroid gland removal for papillary thyroid cancer. On Jan 7, 2012, it was announced that she never had thyroid cancer in the first place! See news report . Why did this happen? And it does happen unfortunately to not only President of a nation, but to ordinary citizens. Without benefit of having access to her medical records, I suspect her medical course went something like this which is what happens in the vast m…

1/07/2012 1

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Argentine President Undergoes Thyroid Surgery

BBC News reported today that popular Argentine President Cristina Fernandez de Kirchner underwent total thyroidectomy for papillary thyroid carcinoma, a highly curable form of thyroid cancer. Thankfully, there were no complications and she is expected to be discharged from the hospital in the next 2 days. Thyroidectomy is when the entire thyroid gland is removed which is necessary whenever thyroid cancer is present. What are some of the complications that could have occurred? • Voc…

1/04/2012 0

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Thyroidectomy (Thyroid Surgery) Risks

Thyroid removal (either total or only one side) is a common surgery performed by general surgeons as well as ENTs for thyroid cancer or masses suspicious for cancer. Though I no longer perform this surgery, I often get asked for my opinion regarding this surgery. Rationale for why surgery should be done or not, I leave to others as it would literally take a textbook, especially given the controversy regarding when to observe and when to surgically remove. Back when I WAS performing thyroid…

12/31/2010 0

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Robotic Surgery for Oral Cancer

I encountered these amazing pictures in the Archives of Otolaryngology-Head & Neck Surgery Dec 2010 edition in an article titled "Transoral Robotic-Assisted Surgery for Head and Neck Squamous Cell Carcinoma". This surgery was performed at Mayo Clinic as well as University of Alabama. Of note, there are also some YouTube videos of robotic surgery for thyroidectomy you can watch below or here . Reference: Transoral Robotic-Assisted Surgery for Head and Neck Squamous Cel…

12/17/2010 2

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YouTube Video on Robotic Thyroidectomy Which Eliminates Neck Incisions

Surgeons in Texas have uploaded a YouTube video showing a thyroidectomy being performed by a robot under surgeon guidance without making any incision on the neck. The robot is utilizes the DaVinci system. Check it out here ! Non-robotic thyroid surgery can be seen in this video here  which does use a neck incision.

8/12/2009 0

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Needle Biopsy of Thyroid Masses Misidentifies 50% of Thyroid Cancers!

Surgeons at the University of Wisconsin found that fine needle aspiration biopsy (FNAB) in 26 of 52 FNAB reported as benign (50.0%) turned out to be either neoplastic (22) or malignant (4) on final pathologic analysis after thyroidectomy . Among patients with nondiagnostic FNAB results, the risk of malignant neoplasms was 27.3%. Even for smaller thyroid masses , FNAB is still not 100% accurate with a falsely negative rate of around 10% . Why is that? Well, one must keep in mind that the…

7/26/2009 0

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