[Is hemithyroidectomy as standard intervention of suspicious puncture cytology justified?]

Since 1989, the operative treatment of 65 patients with suspicious fine-needle aspiration cytology of solitary thyroid nodules has been decided on individual clinical criteria such as the patient's history and morphology of the remaining thyroid tissue. Finally, 9 carcinomas were seen amongst 37 hemithyroidectomy specimens, out of 28 resected thyroid glands 2 were papillary microcarcinomas, whereas the others were benign specimens up until now. Despite a comparatively low perioperative morbidity of the hemithyroidectomy, we see thyroid resections justified in cases of suspicious cytology.