- Sampling Chest Lymph nodes

[Guest guest]

> This may sound dumb, but how to they sample lymph nodes in your

chest?

Those who tend to get a bit queasy about surgery - may want to hit

the 'delete' button now.....

I don't know how standard my exerience is but to do my neck & chest

lymph node sampling, they just sort of lifted up the skin thru

the incision made for the thyroidectomy and took their samples. I

had a little additional bruising after surgery but it was no big deal.

I knew that this neck/chest lumph node sampling would be done prior

to my surgery because they suspected an agressive tumor & I had

multiple lumps neck & chest. My doctor, Dr. IB Rosen, said he likes

to check around while 'in there' to make sure he once he's done,

your done. I've copied one of his article summaries below.

You can't tell I've had any surgery on my chest at all, but my

tt scar is 4 cm instead of the usual 3cm - again no big difference.

dx pap-Hurthle cell variant, tt 9/99, RAI 12/99

......

Am J Surg 1991 Oct;162(4):353-6

Prospective management of nodal metastases in differentiated thyroid

cancer.

McHenry CR, Rosen IB, Walfish PG.

Combined Endocrine Tumor Clinic, Mt. Sinai Hospital, Toronto,

Ontario, Canada.

From the abstract...

Cervical lymph node metastases were associated with a higher incidence

of recurrence and occurred synchronously or preceded the development

of distant metastases in 13 of 15 (87%) patients. Although these findings

were not statistically significant for overall survival, they lend

support to routine cervical lymph node sampling for detection of and

modified neck dissection with adjuvant radioiodine therapy for treatment

of lymph node metastases. Such measures should reduce the subsequent

recurrence rate and permit early detection and treatment of systemic

disease.