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Head & Neck Surgery
When medication and other non-surgical treatments cannot relieve your symptoms, surgery is the recommended treatment for many conditions affecting the head and neck. These include thyroid cancer and throat cancer, a category of conditions that includes tonsil cancer, cancer of the larynx (laryngeal cancer), cancer of the pharynx (pharyngeal cancer) and tongue cancer.
For many years, traditional open surgery has been the standard approach to treating many head and neck conditions. Yet, with open surgery there is the risk for: significant pain, trauma, possible disfigurement, a long recovery and damage to surrounding organs and nerves. Fortunately, less invasive options are available that allow surgeons to access the target anatomy without a large external incision.
For complex cases, robotic-assisted surgery with the da Vinci® Surgical System may be the most effective and least invasive treatment choice. This approach uses tiny, 1-2 cm incisions -- or no incisions in the case of throat cancer surgery. Physicians using da Vinci can operate with greater precision and control, minimizing the pain and risks associated with large incisions. da Vinci Surgery may improve your recovery experience and clinical outcomes with such benefits as:
- Significantly less blood loss1,2,3,4
- No visible scarring or disfigurement2
- No tracheotomy2
- Minimization or elimination of need for chemoradiation therapy2,3
- Preservation of larynx (voice box)5
- Less risk of larynx (voice box) nerve damage5
- Fewer complications1
- Shorter hospital stay1,4
- Fast recovery, return to normal speech and swallowing1
- Equal or better cancer control1
- Excellent cancer control1
As with any surgery, these benefits cannot be guaranteed since surgery is unique to each patient and procedure. The da Vinci Surgical System is considered safe and effective, but may not be appropriate for everyone. Always ask your doctor about all treatment options, the benefits and risks.
Learn More
To learn more about da Vinci Head and Neck Surgery utilizing the da Vinci Surgical System, click here. To find a da Vinci Head and Neck surgeon, use our surgeon locator.
1. Weinstein GS, O’Malley Jr BS, Desai SC, Quon H; Transoral robotic surgery: does the ends justify the means? Current Opinion in Otolaryngology & Head and Neck Surgery,17:126–131, 2009
2. O’Malley Jr. B, Weinstein GS, Snyder W, Hockstein, NG; Transoral Robotic Surgery (TORS) for Base Tongue Neoplasms, Laryngoscope 116: August 2006.
3. Weinstein GS, O’Malley Jr. BW, Synder W, Sherman E, Quon H; Transoral Robotic Surgery, Radical Tonsillectomy; Arch Otolaryngol. Head Neck Surg/Vol. 133 (No. 12), Dec 2007.
4. Boudreaux BA, Rosenthal EL, Magnuson SJ, Newman RJ,, Desmond RA, Clemons L, Carroll WR; Robot-Assisted Surgery for Upper Aerodigestive Tract Neoplasms; Arch Otolaryngol Head Neck Surg/Vol 135 (No. 4), Apr 2009
5. Sang-Wook K et al. Robot-assisted endoscopic surgery for thyroid cancer: experience with the first 100 patients. Accepted: 12 January 2009 Springer Science+Business Media.