Neck surgery is very intrusive and serious type of operation.
Neck surgery is typically used to remove tumors associated with
various forms of cancer, especially throat and neck cancers. Neck
surgery can take up to 20 hours and can have a team of doctors
rotating in and out of the operating room due to the seriousness
and intricacy of the surgery.
The most common form of neck surgery is called the neck
dissection. The neck dissection is the most serious type of neck
surgery that a patient will undergo. This type of neck surgery is
used almost exclusively for cancer patients. The goal of the neck
surgery is to remove any cancerous tissue in the neck. Oftentimes
the lymph nodes will be corrupted by cancer and need to be removed
before the cancer spreads through the lymph nodes and its other
parts of the body.
The lymph nodes are extremely important and author will be
removed during this type of surgery because of cancer gets in the
lymph nodes it will travel throughout the body very quickly and
kill the patient. Once the lymph nodes have been removed the
survival rate of the cancer patient goes up dramatically so this
type of surgery is very important to undergo during various stages
of cancer treatment.
Once the neck surgery is complete the patient will often times
have some form of disfigurement. Unfortunately during a neck
dissection parts of the neck will be removed. This means that the
neck will be smaller than it was before and there will be a large
scar on the patient’s neck.
There are some side effects that most patients will experience
after the surgery. The side effects can last for a few years or
fortunately the permanent depending on how invasive and neck
surgery was. A few side effects include things such as no taste,
numbness in the tongue or the inability to swallow food.
Most patients that undergo this type of neck surgery will
experience at least one of these side effects. Numbness in the
tongue and the loss of taste are the most common side effects
experienced after neck surgery.
Neck surgery is a serious and dangerous procedure but it has
saved a lot of lives by removing cancerous tumors