title: Evaluation of the effectiveness of thoracic sympathectomy in the treatment of primary hyperhidrosis of hands and armpits using the measurement of skin resistance.
abstract: BACKGROUND
  Hyperhidrosis is excessive sweating beyond the needs of thermoregulation. It is disease which mostly affects young people, often carrying a considerable amount of socio-economic implications. Thoracic sympathectomy is now considered to be the "gold standard" in the treatment of idiopathic hyperhidrosis of hands and armpits.
  
  
  OBJECTIVE
  Assessment of early effectiveness of thoracic sympathectomy using skin resistance measurements performed before surgery and in the postoperative period.
  
  
  METHODS
  A group of 20 patients with idiopathic excessive sweating of hands and the armpit was enrolled in the study. Patients underwent two-stage thoracic sympathectomy with resection of Th2-Th4 ganglions. The skin resistance measurements were made at six previously designated points on the day of surgery and the first day after the operation.
  
  
  RESULTS
  In all operated patients we obtained complete remission of symptoms on the first day after the surgery. Inhibition of sweating was confirmed using the standard starch iodine (Minor) test. At all measurement points we obtained a statistically significant increase of skin resistance, assuming p < 0.05. To check whether there is a statistically significant difference in the results before and after surgery we used sequence pairs Wilcoxon test.
  
  
  CONCLUSIONS
  Thoracic sympathectomy is an effective curative treatment for primary hyperhidrosis of hands and armpits. Statistically significant increase of skin resistance in all cases is a good method of assessing the effectiveness of the above surgery in the early postoperative period.
authors.affiliation: Department of Chest Surgery, General and Oncological Surgery, University Hospital WAM and CSW Medical University of Lodz, Poland.
authors.forename: Piotr
authors.initials: P
authors.lastname: Misiak
authors.forename: Sławomir
authors.initials: S
authors.lastname: Jabłoński
authors.forename: Beata
authors.initials: B
authors.lastname: Rzepkowska-Misiak
authors.forename: Lukasz
authors.initials: L
authors.lastname: Piskorz
authors.forename: Marian
authors.initials: M
authors.lastname: Brocki
authors.forename: Szymon
authors.initials: S
authors.lastname: Wcisło
authors.forename: Jacek
authors.initials: J
authors.lastname: Smigielski
authors.forename: Jacek
authors.initials: J
authors.lastname: Kordiak