Hi Dr. Norman -

Could you please speak on the adenomas that move into the chest area?  How and why they end up there.  Are the symptoms different than tumors directly growing on the parathyroid ? Are these tumors more difficult to diagnose, and remove? Are there more complications with these surgeries?  


Thank you!  

Thanks!  I'm working on a Blog now on Parathyroid Tumors in the Chest.  It is about 95% done and I anticipate this blog is the next one to post... hopefully later today!

People worry too much about parathyroid tumors in the chest. We see it about once a week in people who have never had a parathyroid operation before and deal with it right then and there. No big deal. Almost all parathyroid tumors in the chest can be removed through a small neck incision... if the surgeon knows how!

We also have at least one patient per week that is sent to us with a tumor in the chest that was operated on somewhere else and they were unsuccessful removing it. Again, almost always we can remove this tumor through a small (1 inch) neck incision, even when a previous operation was not successful.

The concept that a patient will need to have their sternum split open (like open heart surgery) to remove a parathyroid tumor is rubbish and nonsense... unless they are being treated by doctors who are stuck in 1965.  It is EXTREMELY rare to need your chest opened for a parathyroid tumor in the chest. Like all types of surgery, the key lies in having surgeons who do this all the time.  If your surgeon says they want to crack your chest open... THEN RUN to get a second opinion. This is almost never necessary.

To be clear, there are people with tumors way down low in the chest that cannot be removed from the neck. Almost all of these people can have a small operation that goes between the ribs to remove the tumor. This is a bigger operation than the small neck operation, but is not nearly as big as splitting the sternum down the middle like open heart surgery. There are some extremely rare cases where splitting the sternum is necessary, but this is so rare that we haven't done it in 7 years... which means we've operated on 16,500 people in a row without having to split their sternum.  Thus, nobody that shows up to our center should be worried about this.  Again, to be clear, if your surgeon says you may need your sternum split open, then you MUST get a second opinion because that is old-school and shows a lack of expertise.  We hear surgeons tell patients this several times per week, yet we almost always cure them through a neck incision via an operation that takes less than 20 minutes.   Stop worrying about tumors in your chest!  Worry about finding an expert surgeon and then stop worrying!
Blog out later today or tomorrow!

j

As promised, the blog on chest parathyroid tumors has been published. Read it here:
http://blog.parathyroid.com/parathyroid-adenoma-chest-mediastinum/

Thank you so much Dr. Norman !


  The new blog article is excellent, and as usual, very informative!  This disease continues to baffle and intrigue me at the same time. I am so thankful for all of the information that parathyroid.com, the calcium pro app, and the blog site have provided.  The day that my doctor told me that my Ca was at 11.1, I came home and looked it up....Parathyroid.com was my first encounter in a journey to educate myself, my family, and my endocrinologist. ( Not an easy task on the latter) Although I have to say, I think my endo is starting to come around. The  first words out of her mouth when I saw her this past week were..."So...,did you go to Tampa yet?"  I think she is reading some of the information that I/parathyroid.com provided for her.  She not totally there yet, but I'm working on her.  So with that being said, I couldn't agree more with you in choosing the right surgeon!!!!  

Thank you again so very much!