Post-operative pain control protocol for transoral endoscopic thyroidectomy vestibular approach (TOETVA): reply

Since our development of transoral endoscopic thyroidectomy vestibular approach (TOETVA) (1), many aspects of this innovative scarless thyroidectomy have begun to be investigated to ensure the safety of the procedure (2-6). Recently, we read a letter to the editor stating that postoperative pain for TOETVA in another institute required more analgesic use to achieve adequate pain control (7). This result was different from ours. Thus, we would like to provide clarification of our pain control protocol and the results achieved in our hospital.