<p class="abstract"><strong>Background:</strong> The aim of this study is to assess the thyroid gland involvement in the preoperative contrast enhanced computed tomography (CECT) of neck with histopathology (HPE) in determining the indications for ipsilateral thyroidectomy in patients undergoing total laryngectomy in laryngeal and hypopharyngeal cancers.</p><p class="abstract"><strong>Methods:</strong> Forty patients diagnosed clinically with stage 3 laryngeal and hypopharyngeal cancer were subjected to CECT of neck. Patients with cartilage erosion and extra laryngeal spread on CECT (T3, T4a) were routinely taken for total laryngectomy, partial pharyngectomy and hemi thyroidectomy. Specimens were sent for histopathological analysis and which was compared with preoperative CECT scan.  </p><p class="abstract"><strong>Results:</strong> Of the forty cases, only four patients had thyroid gland involvement in CECT scan and 2 of the 40 had thyroid gland involvement in histopathology. Of the four patients where the CT scan which showed infiltration of the thyroid gland, none had thyroid gland involvement in histopathology. In two patients where thyroid gland was involved in histopathology, CT scan failed to pick up the thyroid gland involvement. Those two patients with histologically proven thyroid gland involvement identify as transglottic malignancy with cartilage erosion and extra laryngeal spread.</p><p class="abstract"><strong>Conclusions:</strong> Our study concludes that an ipsilateral hemi-thyroidectomy is probably still indicated in transglottic cancer with cartilage invasion and/or extra laryngeal spread.</p>

<p>Laryngeal cancer is one of the leading causes of death in Indian males. Papillary thyroid carcinoma is the most common subtype of thyroid cancer in 80% of cases and has a tendency to metastasize to lymph nodes. Patients with laryngeal cancers undergoing laryngectomy might have other occult primaries including thyroid carcinoma especially in patients with recurrent laryngeal carcinomas. We report a case of recurrent laryngeal carcinoma with incidental carcinomas. This study was conducted at TATA medical center, Kolkata.</p>