Intraoperative neuromonitoring of surgery for benign goiter.
BACKGROUND
Recurrent laryngeal nerve (RLN) palsy is one of the most serious complications in thyroid surgery. No prospective studies are available that evaluate if the additional use of intraoperative neuromonitoring reduces the rate of RLN palsy.


METHODS
Between January 1 and December 31, 1998, surgery for histologically benign goiter with intraoperative identification with and without additional intraoperative RLN neuromonitoring was performed on 4,382 patients in 45 hospitals. Data were collected prospectively by questionnaire.


RESULTS
The rate of transient and permanent RLN palsy based on nerves at risk were 1.4% and 0.4% with intraoperative neuromonitoring. These rates were significantly lower (P <0.05) compared with intraoperative visual RLN identification without intraoperative neuromonitoring which resulted in rates of 2.1% and 0.8%, respectively. A multivariate logistic regression analysis confirmed that the use of intraoperative neuromonitoring decreases the rate of postoperative transient (P <0.008) and permanent (P <0.004) RLN palsies as an independent factor by 0.58 and 0.30, respectively.


CONCLUSIONS
Intraoperative neuromonitoring of the RLN in thyroid surgery is recommended because of significantly lower rates of transient and permanent RLN palsy rates in comparison with conventional RLN identification.
Thomusch
Oliver
O
Department of General Surgery, Martin-Luther University Halle, Wittenberg, Germany. o.thomusch@gmx.de
Sekulla
Carsten
C
Walls
Gerard
G
Machens
Andreas
A
Dralle
Henning
H
D005260:Female; D006042:Goiter / Q000601:surgery*; D006801:Humans; D007823:Laryngeal Nerves / Q000502:physiology*; D008297:Male; D008875:Middle Aged; D016343:Monitoring, Intraoperative; D011183:Postoperative Complications / Q000517:prevention & control*; D012044:Regression Analysis; D012189:Retrospective Studies; D012307:Risk Factors; D014826:Vocal Cord Paralysis / Q000209:etiology* / Q000517:prevention & control*