Minimally invasive retroperitoneal adrenalectomy.

The minimally invasive MI approach has become the gold standard in removing the adrenal gland. Both transperitoneal and retroperitoneal techniques were reported safe and effective. The retroperitoneal approach has the advantage of direct access to the gland, easy access to retrocaval tumors, carries no cardiovascular or pulmonary risk of carbon dioxide insufflation to a high intra-abdominal pressure, and is not affected by previous abdominal surgery or radiation. We report a case of MI retroperitoneal adrenalectomy for right adrenal incidentaloma in a recently diagnosed breast cancer patient with multiple medical problems, and emphasize the advantage of this approach over the MI transperitoneal approach in the presence of patient's co-morbidity.

Preoperative neck ultrasonographic mapping for persistent/recurrent papillary thyroid cancer.

Surgical resection of persistent/recurrent (P/R) papillary thyroid cancer (PTC), when localized to the neck, is generally recommended; however, its impact on the course of the disease is not clear. We introduced a new technique in the form of preoperative neck ultrasonographic mapping (US-M) to improve the outcome of the surgical resection of P/R PTC. A total of 19 patients had undergone regional (central, lateral, or both) neck dissection before introducing the current technique (group 1, or G1), and 26 patients (group 2, or G2) had limited lymph node resection guided by US-M with findings accurately plotted on a standard diagram. All of the operations were performed by a single surgeon. The surgical outcomes of the two groups were compared. The resected lesions were positive for PTC in 17 patients (89.5%) in G1 and in 25 patients (96.2%) in G2. In G2, the intraoperative findings exactly matched the US-M in 23 patients (88.5%). Postoperatively, neck US became negative in 50% in G1 and in 83.3% in G2 (p = 0.02). Thyroglobulin (Tg) became undetectable in 37.5% in G1 and 52.3% in G2 (p = 0.37). Whole-body iodine scans (WBS) became negative in one of six patients (16.7%) in G1, and in three of four patients (75%) in G2, (p = 0.06). After a mean follow-up of 23.8+/-7.1 months in G1 and 9.8+/-4.7 months in G2, 6 patients (31.6%) in G1 and 15 patients (62.5%) in G2 were in remission (p = 0.04), whereas the disease persisted in 13 cases (68.4%) in G1 and 9 (37.5%) in G2 (p = 0.04). In conclusion, US-M improved the surgical outcome, as evidenced by the postoperative US, Tg, and WBS findings and the higher remission rate for the G2 patients than for the G1 patients.