[Video-assisted parathyroidectomy in the management of patients with primary hyperparathyroidism]

In recent years, different minimally invasive techniques of parathyroidectomy have been described. We performed a retrospective study to evaluate the indications and results of video-assisted parathyroidectomy (Vap) in the management of our patients with primary hyperparathyroidism (PHPT).

During the last 5 years (1998-2002), we operated on 528 patients with PHPT. Vap was proposed for patients with sporadic PHPT, without associated goiter and without previous neck surgery, in whom a single adenoma was localized by means of sonography and/or sestamibi scanning. Vap was performed by lateral approach with insufflation for patients with adenoma located deeply in the neck and by gasless midline approach for patients with adenoma located anteriorly. A quick parathyroid (qPTH) assay was used during the surgical procedures. Calcemia, phosphoremia and PTH were systematically evaluated in patients on days 1 and 8, 1 month and 1 year after surgery. All patients underwent pre-operative and postoperative investigations of vocal cord movements.

Among 528 patients with PHPT, 228 (43%) were not eligible for Vap: associated nodular goiter (99 cases), previous neck surgery (42 cases), suspicion of multiglandular disease (25 cases), lack of pre-operative localization (48 cases), and miscellaneous causes (14 cases). Vap was performed in 300 patients with sporadic PHPT: 282 lateral access, 17 midline access and 1 thoracoscopy. Median operative time was 50 min (20-130 min). Conversion to conventional parathyroidectomy was required in 42 patients (14%): missed adenomas (11 cases), difficulties of dissection (7 cases), multiglandular disease correctly predicted by qPTH (10 cases); qPTH assay false negative results (3 cases), sestamibi scan false positive results (10 cases) and 1 sonography false positive result. One patient presented definitive recurrent nerve palsy. One patient had a persistent PHPT and one other patient had a recurrent PHPT.

Vap can be proposed for more than half of patients with PHPT. In our experience Vap and conventional parathyroidectomy are complementary. Immediate results of Vap are similar to those obtained with conventional parathyroidectomy but no conclusions can be drawn in terms of influence of Vap on the outcome of the patients operated for PHPT.