Parathyroid autotransplantation in patients with parathyroid disease and total thyroidectomy. Indications in 117 cases.

Parathyroid autotransplantation is a known and increasingly utilized procedure. It is indicated in patients with primary parathyroid hyperplasia, in patients with primary hypercalcemia who have normal parathyroid tissue devascularized during surgery, in patients with secondary and tertiary parathyroid hyperplasia, and in patients with total thyroidectomy when normal parathyroid tissue is accidentally or unavoidably removed or completely devascularized. No normal viable parathyroid tissue should be autotransplanted. This procedure was performed in 13 dialysis patients, 27 primary hypercalcemic patients and 77 patients with thyroidectomy. The hypercalcemic patients had autotransplantations into muscle pockets in the volar surface of the forearm, while the thyroidectomy patients had autotransplantation into the sternocleidomastoid muscles. The application of parathyroid autotransplantation is a major technical and physiologic breakthrough in the field of thyroid and parathyroid surgery. It should greatly reduce the morbidity associated with permanent hypocalcemia in this type of extensive surgery.