Thyroid Disease Diagnosis and Treatment Department

The Department of Thyroid Disease Diagnosis and Treatment was jointly established by leading specialists from General Surgery and Otolaryngology–Head and Neck Surgery, and has a highly skilled clinical team. The department has 32 beds and currently has 6 physicians, including 1 chief physician, 3 deputy chief physicians, 1 attending physician, and 1 resident physician. Among the physicians, 5 hold doctoral degrees, 1 holds a master’s degree, and 1 is a doctoral supervisor; many have studied abroad. The department is equipped with advanced medical equipment, including the most advanced nerve monitoring system available domestically, 3.0T MRI, the FOCUS ultrasonic scalpel, a high-frequency electrosurgical unit, a color Doppler ultrasound diagnostic system, an ultra-high-definition laryngoscope, 64-slice CT, and 3.0T MRI.

Thyroid Surgery adheres to a patient-centered approach, with medical quality as its core principle. It follows the principles of standardized and minimally invasive diagnosis and treatment of thyroid tumors, and is characterized by precise and individualized treatment. The department currently has a range of high-end, sophisticated, and cutting-edge medical support equipment, as well as advanced treatment methods. Its current scope of practice includes the surgical treatment of various thyroid tumors, parathyroid diseases, some neck tumors, and hoarseness caused by thyroid surgery; surgical treatment of giant goiters and retrosternal thyroid tumors; voice rehabilitation after thyroid surgery; and surgical treatment of parathyroid adenomas, hyperplasia or parathyroid carcinoma, and secondary hyperparathyroidism.

Thyroid Surgery has strong clinical capabilities and highly proficient professional skills. For patients with thyroid tumors, preoperative diagnosis and assessment are performed using ultrasound, fine-needle aspiration cytology (FNA), and other methods. A distinctive comprehensive prevention and treatment system has been established covering thyroid tumor prevention, needle biopsy, early diagnosis, surgical treatment, postoperative assessment, recurrence prevention, and follow-up. In 2018, our department was the first in Qingdao to perform endoscopic minimally invasive surgery for thyroid cancer. This technique leaves no surgical scar on the neck and provides better cosmetic results than conventional thyroid surgery. We now perform various thyroid operations using endoscopic approaches. The department performs intraoperative ultrasound localization to enable precise removal of lesions that are difficult to identify by palpation and exploration. Intraoperative nerve monitoring is used to effectively avoid injury to the recurrent laryngeal and superior laryngeal nerves while removing tumors, resulting in low rates of postoperative hoarseness and choking or coughing while drinking. Nanocarbon technology is used for intraoperative parathyroid visualization, effectively reducing the likelihood of intraoperative parathyroid injury and lowering the likelihood of postoperative hypocalcemia.

The department has undertaken 3 projects funded by the National Natural Science Foundation of China, projects funded by the Natural Science Foundation of Shandong Province, and 12 Qingdao Science and Technology Development projects. It has received the Qingdao Science and Technology Progress Award twice and has published more than 100 papers. The department attaches great importance to clinical and basic research on thyroid and parathyroid diseases and has a specimen bank and laboratory.

The department serves as a postdoctoral workstation and currently has 1 postdoctoral fellow in residence. Professor Mao Weizheng, honorary director of the Thyroid Disease Center, is a doctoral supervisor and has trained 2 postdoctoral fellows, 3 doctoral students, and more than 50 master’s students.

Four members of the department have studied abroad. The department maintains close contact with multiple medical and research institutions, including the Department of Surgical Oncology at Kyushu University Hospital in Japan, MD Anderson Cancer Center, Texas Medical Center in the United States, Russian Medical University, and Beijing Tongren Hospital affiliated with Capital Medical University. The department also invites leading thyroid and head-and-neck specialists from across China to conduct academic exchanges and collaborate on surgeries, and sends department personnel each year to leading hospitals in China and abroad for further training.

Editing time: 2026/5/20 15:43:59