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Melvin J. Fratkin, MD; Heber H. Newsome, Jr, MD; Alton R. Sharpe, Jr, MD; James L. Tatum, MD

Arch Surg. 1983;118(7):864-867.

Abstract
• The use of postoperative radioiodine thyroid scanning has questioned whether total thyroidectomy is surgically possible. Similar to earlier studies, we have found functioning iodine 131 (¹³¹l)—avid thyroid tissue in our patients following total thyroidectomy for thyroid cancer. Preoperative and postoperative thyroid scans were compared in 24 patients to study the cervical location of postthyroidectomy residual thyroid tissue. Thyroid scanning detected 44 distinct sites of uptake. Thirty-eight of these foci were located either at the extremes of the upper poles of the thyroid gland (24) or along the embryonic thyroid descent tract (14). We conclude that these foci of ¹³¹l uptake represent incomplete resection of normal thyroid tissue, and that surgical attention to these areas should result more frequently in extirpation of the entire thyroid gland.

(Arch Surg 1983;118:864-867)

Author Affiliations
From the Endocrine Division, Department of Medicine (Drs Fratkin and Sharpe); the General Surgery Division, Department of Surgery (Dr Newsome); and the Nuclear Medicine Division, Department of Radiology (Drs Fratkin, Sharpe, and Tatum), Medical College of Virginia, Virginia Commonwealth University, Richmond.

Footnotes
Accepted for publication Sept 16, 1982.

Read before the 67th annual meeting of the Radiological Society of North America, Chicago, Nov 19, 1981.

Reprint requests to Medical College of Virginia, Box 481, MCV Station, Richmond, VA 23298 (Dr Fratkin).