Our patients come from all over the world, sometimes from as close as a next door neighbor or a local endocrinologist here in Austin. Other times, our reputation over 5 decades of thyroid surgery will draw patients from as far away as Hong Kong. Poland, Canada, the Canary islands, the Ivory coast of Africa, Sweden, New York City, Chicago, Kuwait, the United Arab Emirates, Iraq, Peru, Germany, Bolivia and the list goes on.

Many years ago I met a nice lady on vacation in the Cayman Islands who on examination there in the sands of the Caribbean was found to have a thyroid cancer, and they later came to our thyroid surgery center for successful treatment. She and her family have become long time friends of our family and, as they are very religious folks, they believe God sent us to that island to meet and save her life since her doctors back home in Florida had told her not to worry about “that little cyst”. I don’t know if God intervened or not, but what are the odds that we two people would meet on an isolated piece of sand thousands of miles from home, and she would have serious undiagnosed thyroid problems and I was a thyroid tumor expert.

Once, while performing a thyroidectomy, I glanced up at the Anesthetist giving anesthesia as I operated on my thyroidectomy patient, and I identified a significant thyroid tumor in her neck as the light hit her neck just so. I later operated on her and the tumor was, fortunately, benign. I’ve gone to the floor to make rounds and found thyroid tumors in the very nurses who were taking care of my post op patients! In one sad case the nurse was insured by an HMO and she was forced to go see a doctor who did not specialize in thyroid surgery.

Our patients come from every geographic location, and from the wealthy and from the poor, and from all races and religious denominations. One common thread that we have seen in virtually all our patients is that, regardless of their education level, they are smart, inquisitive, well researched about their thyroid problem, and they universally are looking for the best possible surgeon to care for them.

Recently, a young lady and her husband flew their plane here from Phoenix for thyroid surgery. She underwent her thyroid operation on Tuesday and is shown here next to their airplane 48 hours later, feeling great, prior to flying home. Now not everyone recovers as quickly, and others recover even faster but this story is fairly typical of our patients experience here. Factors that can influence recovery time include age, extent of disease, other medical problems and diagnosis.