ABSTRACT
Essential hyperhidrosis is a condition with excessive sweating, which may be localized in any part of the body. Excessive sweating has a strong negative impact on the quality of life for many persons. From June 1992 to May 1996, 211 cases of thoracoscopic thoracic sympathectomy were performed in the Department of Thoracic Surgery, Yongdong Severance Hospital, Seoul, Korea. Among the 211 cases, 192 patients had palmar hyperhidrosis, and 19 cases had facial hyperhidrosis. There were 121 males and 90 females, and the ages ranged from 10 to 67 years(average: 24.82 years old). The average operation time and the average postoperative hospital stay were 91.94 minutes and 4.31 days, respectively. Perioperative courses were uneventful, and all the patients had immediate and complete relief of symptoms with mild compensatory sweating on the chest wall and the back. Even though a thoracoscopy has the possibility of emergency conversion to a thoracotomy and technical difficulties still exist, especially in patients with facial hyperhidrosis, our experience indicates that video-assisted thoracoscopic thoracic sympathectomy is a very safe and useful procedure for hyperhidrosis.