Tulane University School of Medicine surgeon Dr. Emad Kandil is one of the first in the country to perform a new form of endoscopic surgery that uses a small incision under the arm to remove all or a portion of the thyroid or parathyroid glands without leaving a scar on the neck.
The technique, which was approved by the U.S. Food and Drug Administration this summer, uses the latest Da Vinci- three-dimensional, high-definition robotic equipment to make a two-inch incision below the armpit that allows doctors to maneuver a small camera and specially designed instruments between muscles to access the thyroid. The diseased tissue is removed endoscopically through the armpit incision.
"This is an exciting new treatment option for certain patients who need thyroid surgery but are concerned about having a visible and permanent neck scar," says Kandil, who is chief of the Endocrine Surgery Section, assistant professor of surgery and adjunct assistant professor of otolaryngology at Tulane. "This technique safely removes the thyroid without leaving so much as a scratch on the neck."
Traditional thyroidectomies can involve a long incision at the base of the neck.
Kandil is performing the "scarless" thyroidectomy surgery at Tulane Medical Center and is one of only a few surgeons in the United States trained in the technique. In fact, he chairs an annual symposium at Tulane to teach surgeons how to perform minimally invasive thyroid surgery and will be teaching the technique to doctors from across the country.