Dissection and hemostasis with hydroxilated polyvinyl acetal tampons in open thyroid surgery.docVIP

Annals of Surgical Innovation and Research BioMedCentral Research article Open Access Dissection and hemostasis with hydroxilated polyvinyl acetal tampons in open thyroid surgery Gianlorenzo Dionigi*, Luigi Boni, Francesca Rovera and Renzo Dionigi Address: Department of Surgical Sciences, University of Insubria, Viale Borri 57, 21100 Varese, Italy Email: Gianlorenzo Dionigi* - gianlorenzo.dionigi@uninsubria.it; Luigi Boni - luigi.boni@uninsubria.it; Francesca Rovera - francesca.rovera@uninsubria.it; Renzo Dionigi - renzo.dionigi@uninsubria.it * Corresponding author Published: 20 February 2007 Received: 1 April 2006 Accepted: 20 February 2007 Annals of Surgical Innovation and Research 2007, 1:3 doi:10.1186/1750-1164-1-3 This article is available from: /content/1/1/3 ? 2007 Dionigi et al; licensee BioMed Central Ltd. This is an Open Access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (/licenses/by/2.0), which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited. Abstract Background: The essential objectives for thyroidectomy are: avoidance of injury to the recurrent laryngeal nerves, conservation of the parathyroid glands, an accurate haemostasis and an excellent cosmesis. In the last 10 years major improvements and new technologies have been proposed and applied in thyroid surgery; among these mini-invasive thyroidectomy, regional anaesthesia and intraoperative neuromonitoring, and new devices for achieving dissection and haemostasis. Minor bleeding from small vessels could be a major complication in thyroid surgery. The purpose of ligating vessels is to maintain the surgical site free from an excess of blood and reduce blood loss in the patient. Materials and methods: Hydroxylated polyvinyl acetal tampons (HPA) are made by a synthetic, open cell foam structure able to absorb fluids up to 25 times the initial weight.