Trans-oral Thyroid Shave (Laryngotracheoplasty)

The purpose of this surgical procedure is to reduce a prominent ADAM’s apple in man or transgender woman that are disturbed from its appearance.

Until now the only approach to thyroid shave was the trans-cervical approach leaving the patient with a visible scar in the neck, substituting one cosmetic deformity with another.

Recently Dr. Hefetz started using the trans-vestibular trans-oral approach. This approach was described recently for scar-less thyroid and parathyroid surgery by Rakph Tufano from Johns Hopkins university and for the last year Dr Hefetz performed over 50 trans-oral thyroidectomy and parathyroidectomy using this unique approach. Lately Dr Hefetz thought that we may be able to reduce the thyroid cartilage and flatten a pronounced ADAM’s apple through this scar=less approach. A cartilage shaver was designed specifically for that procedure and was examined on cadavers. Following institutional approval four trans-gender woman underwent the surgical procedure.

The operation took 1.5-2 hours and in all patients it was uneventful.
Hospital stay was 1 day (as in all trans-oral endoscopic thyroid and parathyroid surgery).
There is no limitation in diet or speech immediately following surgery.
Attached are patients prior to and following the surgical procedure: