Patient-reported voice and swallowing outcomes and their impact on quality of life in the late postoperative period following total thyroidectomy.
Lívia Lima do Nascimento Silva, Vivian Lisboa de Lucena, Ana Flávia de Sales Cândido and 3 others
Women 6+ months after total thyroidectomy still report significant voice and swallowing symptoms, with fatigue and mental health the most affected quality-of-life areas.
Voice symptoms dominate over swallowing. These patients may need ongoing SLP assessment well past the typical recovery window.
Key findings
1Vocal symptoms contributed the largest proportion (48.98%) to the total TVSQ score, predominating over swallowing and cervical-thoracic symptoms.
2The median total TVSQ score was 26 on a 0-to-80 scale, with the two highest individual scores (49 and 48) belonging to participants who also had neck dissection.
3Among quality-of-life domains, fatigue scored highest, followed by emotional aspects, anxiety, cognitive problems, and depression.
to read the rest of this summary — three full summaries a month, no card.
Already have an account?
What it does not show
Only 17 participants, all biological females, from a single hospital — results cannot be generalised to men, to other surgical contexts, or to other populations. No instrumental voice or swallowing tests were performed; findings rest entirely on self-report questionnaires. Descriptive statistics only; no inferential analysis, no comparison group, and no control for confounders. Time since surgery ranged widely (2004–2022), and surgical techniques and care protocols changed over that period, introducing a confounding factor the authors acknowledge. Possible selection bias: patients were recruited from the hospital's own SLP department records and from those attending appointments, which may over-represent symptomatic individuals. The TVSQ Brazilian-Portuguese version does not yet have defined clinical cutoffs, so scores cannot be interpreted against established thresholds.
Declared interests
No financial support or conflicts of interest declared.
Summarised by AI from the full paper, without a clinician reviewing it. Check it against the source before it changes what you do. Read it on PubMed →