Follow-up Distress in Patients Undergoing Partial Thyroidectomy for Thyroid Cancer: a Descriptive Cohort Study

Abstract

Thyroid nodules are a common issue in clinical practice, and 5 to 10% of them are malignant. Surgery remains the principal treatment, and total or partial thyroidectomy can be performed. Years ago, total thyroidectomy was the main recommendation in the guidelines, but studies have shown that partial surgery is acceptable in less aggressive cases. The type of surgery depends on the surgeon's expertise and the preservation of the patient's quality of life, so that the entire tumor is removed. Some issues may put the surgeon in distress when deciding to perform the partial operation, as they may lead to the need for reoperation. In this study, we retrospectively analyzed electronic medical records of patients with well-differentiated thyroid carcinoma undergoing partial thyroidectomy between 2015 and 2020 and reported what were the situations of distress related to the cases and the outcome (need of reoperation). In our sample, 63 (13,7%) of 458 patients with differentiated thyroid cancer treated surgically have undergone partial thyroidectomy and, of these, 10 (15,9%) patients had factors that caused distress to the surgeon and 53 (84,1%) had not. Of the patients with distress factors, five (50%) needed reoperation. Our results show that even when distress factors are present, partial thyroidectomy is still a viable option to the surgeon. We believe that the results obtained will help doctors in clinical practice to choose the surgical modality indicated for each patient.