Comparison of endoscopic diathermy and resection in the surgical treatment of pharyngeal diverticula

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Abstract
Pharyngeal diverticula were classified by Zenker and Ziemssen in 1877, but it was not until 1886 that Wheeler reported the 1st successful excision. Excision of diverticula at that time carried a high operative mortality due to sepsis, and consequently Goldman proposed a 2-stage opertaon in 1909 to try to overcome this. The 2-stage operation became the treatment of choice, but following the advent of antibiotics this was largely superseded by the 1-stage procedure. Endoscopic diathermy as a method of treating pharyngeal diverticula was pioneered by Dohlman, who reported a series of 39 patients treated with this technique between 1939 and 1945. By 1958 his series had risen to nearly 100 patients, with a recurrence rate of only 7% and no associated deaths or severe complications. There has been no previous study directly comparing the external and endoscopic methods of treatment of pharyngeal diverticula. This paper sets out to compare the 2 methods retrospectively in a series of 60 patients.