NHS 'should remove more tonsils'

A study of Finnish patients with recurring pharyngitis found that just four per cent visited their doctor with a severe sore throat in the five months after having their tonsils removed, compared with 43 per cent who were still waiting for the surgery.

British doctors said the findings were further evidence that tonsillectomies, which have become much less common in recent decades, are an effective treatment and should be more widely used.

In the 1950s about 200,000 children and young adults had their tonsils removed each year, but the cost and perceived overuse of the procedure led to a decline in later decades.

Health data from 2009-10 shows that the number of operations per year had dropped below 50,000, with patients often given alternative treatments such as antibiotics instead

The new study by experts from the University of Oulu in Finland followed 86 patients aged 14 and above with recurring pharyngitis, 46 of whom had been randomly chosen for a tonsillectomy and 40 of whom were placed on a waiting list.

During the a five month period only two tonsillectomy patients (4 per cent) visited a doctor with a severe sore throat compared with 17 in the untreated group (43 per cent).
Eighteen patients who had been given the surgery (39 per cent) reported experiencing a sore throat at some point during the five month period, compared with 32 of the untreated patients (80 per cent).

The researchers wrote in the Canadian Medical Association Journal: "These reductions resulted in fewer medical visits and fewer absences from school or work. Patients who underwent surgery also felt that their quality of life improved."

Andrew McCombe, a consultant surgeon and spokesman for ENT UK, the British association of ear, nose and throat specialists, said the NHS should "without doubt" be making the procedure more widely available.
A ten-year study of health data published in 2011 found that a decline in tonsillectomies was tied to an increase in emergency admissions to hospital with complications related to tonsillitis such as severe swelling or abscesses.

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