PHOENIX-Performing salvage surgery after chemoradiation or radiation treatment for laryngeal cancer patients, rather than just performing primary surgery right away, appears to lead to more complications with patients’ tracheoesophageal voice prostheses, according to a retrospective study reported by researchers here.
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September 2009Patients who were first treated either with radiotherapy or chemoradiation, then had salvage surgery performed later, had significantly more leakage around their prostheses, among other problems, than those who had primary surgery performed, researchers from Johns Hopkins University found during an examination of all the total laryngectomies performed at the Johns Hopkins Medical Center from 1998 to 2008.
When we looked at the number of leaks around the voice prostheses, we did find a significant difference between the groups, said Heather Starmer, MA, a speech-language pathologist who presented the findings at the American Head and Neck Society Meeting, conducted as part of the Combined Otolaryngology Spring Meeting.