Thyroglossal surgery in Scotland 1981–2010

Abstract

Background and aims

Thyroglossal surgery is not common in Scotland with 0.013 procedures performed per 1000 population in 2010. There is a growing practice in surgery to consolidate service providers to ensure a minimum ‘case volume’, with the belief that this will raise standards and improve co-ordination of services. We investigated thyroglossal surgery to see if this had occurred.

Methods and results

Data on thyroglossal surgery performed in Scotland from 1981 to 2010 were obtained from the Information Services Division of NHS Scotland. This was analysed to investigate the number of procedures involving thyroglossal tissue, the surgical speciality of operating surgeon and the health board in which the procedure was performed. Whilst the number of thyroglossal operations has remained essentially static over the study period, there has been a steady trend of consolidation of the surgical speciality performing the procedure. In 1981, 58% of thyroglossal surgery was performed by general surgeons, 18% by paediatric surgeons and 15% by ENT surgeons nationally. In 2010, ENT surgeons are performing 81%.

Conclusions

Our data suggest that the provision of thyroglossal surgery is being consolidated in Scotland by speciality and that ENT surgeons are providing this service in the majority of cases.