Local Anesthesia With Monitored Anesthesia Care vs General Anesthesia in Thyroidectomy: A Randomized Study.

Background: Early in the 20th century, thyroid surgery was performed using local anesthetic techniques. When general anesthesia became safer, surgeons started performing thyroidectomy exclusively under general anesthesia. However, recent descriptions of thyroidectomy under local anesthesia claim similar results to thyroidectomy under general anesthesia.