General & Endocrine Surgery

 

​​Welcome to the Endocrine and General Surgery Unit of Western Health (GES Unit), which provides a comprehensive endocrine surgery service to the people of the Western suburbs of Melbourne, and across Victorian regional areas. We are based at the Footscray Hospital, and we are the largest endocrine surgery unit in the west of Melbourne.

What is Endocrine Surgery?

Endocrine surgery refers to operations performed on one or more of the endocrine glands. The endocrine system is one of the control systems of the body. Endocrine glands release chemicals, called hormones, into the bloodstream, which travel to their target organs and cells. The hormones then result in a change in the activity of those cells.

Endocrine surgeons are surgeons with special expertise and training in operations on a number of the endocrine glands including the thyroid gland, the parathyroid glands, and the adrenal glands.

GES Endocrine Surgery Unit of Western Health

Our unit specialises in the surgical treatment of all the major areas of endocrine pathology in the thyroid, parathyroid and adrenal glands. We have a very talented and dedicated team of surgeons, pathologists, radiologists, nuclear medicine physicians, and nursing staff, and we work closely with our medical colleagues in the Western Health Department of Endocrinology.

We also provide services in the surgery of the salivary glands, and perform diagnostic lymph node biopsies as part of the Haematology/Oncology team.

There are six specialised endocrine surgeons in the Unit, an Endocrine Surgery Fellow, along with a surgical registrar and two interns.

We see patients in a weekly outpatient clinic at the Footscray campus of Western Health, and all endocrine operations are performed in the operating theatres there. In addition, general surgical elective cases are performed at Footscray or Williamstown hospitals, and GES surgeons also form a part of the Footscray Hospital on-call surgical service for general surgical emergencies.

What surgery do we do?

Surgical operations are performed for thyroid nodules, goitres, thyrotoxicosis, Graves’ disease and thyroid cancers, for parathyroid tumours and diseases, and for adrenal gland tumours, using minimally invasive techniques or laparoscopic (keyhole) surgery.

All surgeons in the Unit use the intraoperative voice nerve monitor as standard for patients having thyroid surgery.