Main Page | See live article | Alphabetical index A thyroidectomy involves the surgical removal all or part of the thyroid gland. Doctors often perform a thyroidectomy when a patient has thyroid cancer or some other condition of the thyroid gland (such as hyperthyroidism). The thyroid produces several hormones, such as thyroxine (T4) and triiodothyronine (T3), and contains the parathyroid glands, which produce calcitonin. After the removal of a thyroid patients usually take prescribed oral synthetic thyroid hormones to prevent the most serious manifestations of the resultant hypothyroidism. External Link http://health.yahoo.com/health/encyclopedia/001159/0.html This article is from Wikipedia. All text is available under the terms of the GNU Free Documentation License.