Total thyroidectomy: its role in the management of thyroid disease

Of 7812 patients treated for thyroid disease in the Endocrine Surgical Unit at the Royal North Shore Hospital, 825 underwent total thyroidectomy as an initial procedure. One third of these patients (269) were operated on for malignancy and the remaining 556 were treated for benign conditions such as multinodular goitre (405), Graves' Disease (79) and thyroiditis (45). The rate of recurrent laryngeal nerve palsy was 0.5% while permanent hypoparathyroidism occurred in 0.6% of cases, the low complication rate being due to the technique of capsular dissection employed in the Unit. The number of total thyroidectomies performed as a percentage of all thyroid operations has risen from 4% in 1970 to more than 40% in 1990. The majority of this increase has been due to surgery for multinodular goitre where the proportion of patients treated by total thyroidectomy now exceeds 80%. A similar but smaller increase has been seen in an analysis of the New South Wales figures for all other public and private hospitals. It is concluded that the complication rate from total thyroidectomy can no longer be used to argue against its use as the definitive operation for malignant disease of the thyroid. Furthermore, in view of the risks of re-operative surgery, total thyroidectomy should be considered the operation of choice for most benign disease affecting the whole thyroid gland such as multinodular goitre, thyroiditis, and in a significant number of goitres affected by thyrotoxicosis.