New Technologies in Thyroid Surgery

One of the earliest references to a successful surgical attempt for the treatment of goitre can be found in the medical writings of the Moorish physician Ali Ibn Abbas. In 952 A.D., he recorded his experience with the removal of a large goitre under opium sedation using simple ligatures and hot cautery irons as the patient sat with a bag around his neck to catch the blood. The first accounts of thyroid surgery for the treatment of goiters were given by Roger Frugardi in 1170. In response to failure of medical treatment, two setons were inserted at right angles into the goiter and tightened twice daily until the goiter separated. The open wound was treated with caustic powder and left to heal. The first successful typical partial thyroidectomy was performed by the French Surgeon, Pierre Joseph Desault, in 1791 during the French Revolution. Dupuytren followed in 1808 with the first total thyroidectomy, but the patient died 36 hours after the operation.