Diabetes and Endocrinology

Clinical Endocrinology: Surgery and Care

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Endocrine surgery is a specialized surgical field where procedures are performed on Endocrine glands to achieve a hormonal or anti-hormonal effect in the body. Almost always, this entails operating to remove a tumor which has grown on or within an endocrine gland. A common approach is endoscopic endonasal surgery. The field of Endocrine surgery typically comprises surgery for the thyroid gland, parathyroid glands, and adrenal glands. The most common Endocrine surgery operation is removal of the thyroid (thyroidectomy), followed by parathyroid surgery (parathyroidectomy), and followed by the rare operation on the adrenal gland (adrenalectomy). Although not typically referred to as Endocrine surgery, it could be argured that surgery of the pituitary gland, testicles, ovaries, and pancreas are also forms of endocrine surgery since these glands are hormone producing glands as well. More classically, however, only thyroid, parathyroid and adrenal surgery are thought of as "endocrine surgery" with pituitary surgery typically thought of as a form of neurosurgery; testicle surgery typically thought of as urologic surgery; ovary surgery typically thought of as a form of gynecologic surgery; and pancreatic surgery typically thought of as oncology surgery.