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Fish bones as a foreign body are often present in the palatine tonsil and the base of the tongue. Such foreign bodies can often be diagnosed with inspection only. However, it is difficult to diagnose and extirpate a foreign body when it is buried in the oral/pharyngeal mucosa. We experienced a case of a fish bone foreign body buried in the tongue muscle layer. We report herein on the case of a 49-year-old man with a fish bone foreign body buried in his tongue. The patient had noticed a sore throat since eating a sea bream and was referred to our department. Visual inspection revealed no foreign body, but CT imaging revealed a fish bone in the tongue. We performed an emergency surgical exploration of tongue to locate the fish bone. Because the fish bone as a foreign body was unable to be confirmed by palpation, we identified the location of the fish bone by intraoperative CT. This is a rare case of a fish bone buried in the tongue muscle layer, and intraoperative CT was useful in identifying the positon of the foreign body.

Postoperative parathyroid function was evaluated in 24 total thyroidectomy and 8 subtotal thyroidectomy patients seen by our department between January 1995 and July 1997. Parathyroid function was assessed by measuring the level of serum intact parathyroid hormon (intact-PTH). Hypoparathyroidism was avoided in 23 patients (95.8%) who received a total thyroidectomy and in 7 patients (87.5%) who received a subtotal thyroidectomy. Supplementary therapy for hypoparathyroidism was not required as long as the blood supply to more than two parathyroid glands was preserved. Half of the patients in this study did not require any postoperative supplementary therapy. Thus, the preservation of more than two parathyroid glands is essential for the prevention of hypoparathyroidism. In cases where the parathyroid glands had been resected, parathyroid gland transplantation were performed. In all cases, supplementary therapy was eventually no longer required. In two cases requiring supplementary therapy, a normal range of parathyroid activity was observed 30 months after surgery. The administration of vitamin D3 may suppress the recovery of parathyroid function in patients recieving parathyroid transplantations.

In our hospital, ultrasonography is performed for patients who come for thyroid cancer screening. Seventy-eight patients with thyroid cancer which was found by such screening were operated on from 1989 to 1998, while 287 patients with thyroid cancer found by other methods were operated on during the same period in our department. The age of the patients at surgery in the screening group was younger than that of the contrast group. In the screening group, 41 (52.6%) patients had small thyroid cancer, a higher rate that in the contrast group. Invasion of surrounding organs by the primary cancer was observed in only one patient (1.3%) in the screening group, a rate of invasion that was statistically lower than that in the contrast group. Twenty-six patients with benign thyroid disease detected in our screening were operated on during the same period. Careful selection of patients who need fine-needle aspiration cytology is demanded of head and neck surgeons, and careful evaluation of indicators is necessary to avoid surgery in the case of benign thyroid disease.

During a 66-month period, 2849 patients with thyroid gland tumor were examined by fine needle aspiration cytology (FNA) under ultrasonographic imaging at Yamada Red Cross Hospital. Of these patients, 333 received surgical therapy and histological examinations were performed. FNA yielded an accuracy of 92.4%, a specificity of 100% and a sensitivity of 88.3%. There were 16 false-negative reports which were mainly considered to be due to calcified lesions, cystic lesion, or follicular carcinoma. Among the 188 negative cases, 24 cases (12.8%) proved to be positive by repeated FNA-Preoperative FNA provides cytological information and may assist in the determination of the operative indication. This approach resulted in an increased rate of surgery of thyroid malignancies among all thyroid gland surgeries. This method need to be improved to reduce false-negative results and the combination of FNA diagnosis and other examination is necessary.