Why is the voice hoarse after esophageal cancer surgery? Can it be cured?

On June 25, 2021, the 90th patient education live broadcast of TopMD's brand patient education column in the field of oncology, "Let's Meet the Great Doctor", discussed the following content: @Esophageal cancer patients: You need to understand these key points for minimally invasive surgery.

This live broadcast is the sixth episode of TopMD's "Let's Meet the Great Doctor" (Season 2) "Outstanding Surgical Experts Show". We invited Professor Lian Jianhong, deputy director and chief physician of the Second Department of Thoracic Surgery of Shanxi Cancer Hospital, to broadcast live on the homepages of TopMD's all-media matrix: Sina News, Tencent News, Tencent Video, Healthy China TV, Toutiao, Xigua Video, Baidu Health, and Qutoutiao, with 1,508,918 online views.

For the convenience of patients, we edited the essence of this live broadcast into an anti-cancer public course and broadcast it twice on the entire network. Today's episode (2) has been synchronized to the TopMD full network media matrix: People's Daily client, Xinhuanet client, Toutiao, NetEase News, Sohu News, Tencent News, Science Popularization China, CCTV Video, iQiyi, Qutoutiao. Let's talk about: In the last program, we talked about esophageal cancer surgery. Due to the recurrent laryngeal nerve lymph node dissection, patients may have hoarseness after surgery. Is this temporary or permanent? Will it get better in the future? What should we do if hoarseness occurs?

We should have a correct understanding of the problem of hoarseness after esophageal cancer surgery. Hoarseness after esophageal cancer surgery is generally temporary. Moreover, with the continuous improvement of medical technology and levels, the number of patients suffering from hoarseness after surgery is much less than before.

Moreover, hoarseness caused by this kind of surgery usually does not require drug intervention. For example, unilateral recurrent laryngeal nerve paralysis can be compensated by the contralateral recurrent laryngeal nerve within 3 to 6 months after surgery, which means that the voice can be restored to normal slowly. When patients are discharged from the hospital, doctors will teach them some ways to exercise their vocal cords to help them get rid of the problem of hoarseness. For example, read more newspapers at home, read loudly, and try to speak.

So what other complications may occur after esophageal cancer surgery? How to solve the problems of anastomotic fistula, chylothorax, and reflux after surgery? How to solve the problem of patients who are unable to eat during treatment or in the late stage? Today's program has a lot of practical information, and it explains the complications and precautions after esophageal cancer surgery.

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