Why Choose the Pediatric Thyroid Center

The Pediatric Thyroid Center at Children's Hospital of Philadelphia (CHOP) is one of the few centers in the nation dedicated to the unique medical needs of children and adolescents with thyroid disease.

Our experienced team

The Pediatric Thyroid Center’s multidisciplinary team of experts offers an unparalleled level of expertise and the resources needed to provide optimal and individualized care for each child with thyroid disease. When choosing an endocrinologist and/or surgeon to treat your child’s thyroid condition, be sure to consider his or her experience. 

Our center is led by Andrew J. Bauer, MD, FAAP, an internationally recognized leader in pediatric thyroid disease, and Sogol Mostoufi-Moab, MD, MSCE, a pediatrician trained in both endocrinology and oncology. Together, Drs. Bauer and Mostoufi-Moab have evaluated more than 5,000 children for thyroid disease, and every day the number of the patients they evaluate and treat and the complexity of their diseases are increasing.

In fact, the Pediatric Thyroid Center at CHOP is the busiest center of its kind in the United States. Each year our team:

  • Evaluates more than 50 new patients with Graves’ disease. 
  • Evaluates more than 200 new patients with thyroid nodules.
  • Performs 80 or more thyroid surgeries by our two thyroid surgeons, Scott Adzick, MD, MMM, FACS, FAAP, and Ken Kazahaya, MD, MBA, FACS.
  • Provides ongoing care for more than 150 patients with thyroid cancer (diagnose three to four new thyroid cancer patients per month).

Why choose CHOP for thyroid surgery?

For children who require thyroid surgery, finding a pediatric-trained surgeon is critical to achieving the best possible outcome while reducing the potential risks of surgical complications, specifically damage to the parathyroid glands (small pea-shaped glands that are behind the thyroid and produce a hormone that controls blood calcium levels) and the recurrent laryngeal nerve (nerves that control our vocal cords).

Thyroid surgery volumes: Most experienced surgical teams will complete at least 30 thyroid surgeries per year, but the surgeons at the Pediatric Thyroid Center at CHOP perform more than 80 thyroid surgeries a year.

This huge volume has allowed our thyroid specialists to develop the unique skill set required to:

  • Identify risk factors for developing thyroid disease.
  • Provide detailed review of ultrasound images.
  • Determine if fine needle aspiration evaluation would be beneficial to the patient.
  • Develop a patient-specific treatment plan, both medical and surgical, based on interpretation of the history, physical exam, and radiologic and laboratory results.
  • Ensure the appropriate use of radioactive iodine imaging and treatment.

Thyroid surgery outcomes: Our center also has an extraordinarily low complication rate after thyroidectomy – recurrent laryngeal nerve injury (0.4%) and permanent surgical hypoparathyroidism (0.6%). A study published in the Annals of Surgery in 2016 reports that a patient undergoing total thyroidectomy is far more likely to experience these complications if the surgeon performs fewer than 25 thyroid surgeries per year. Surgeons on the CHOP Pediatric Thyroid Center team perform more than three times that number of surgeries each year.

Our pediatric environment

There are clear differences in how a child or adolescent is treated when care is provided in a pediatric setting compared to an adult setting. Every person you’ll meet is here to provide the best possible experience and care, tailored to the unique needs of children. Administrative staff, security, nurses, technicians in the lab and radiology, physicians, and all other team members will work to reduce your and your child’s anxiety and ensure your family understands every aspect of diagnosis and treatment.

Our specially trained child life specialists are always available to be at your child’s side for outpatient procedures and before surgery. These important members of our team will do whatever they can to reduce the worry that is a normal part of undergoing medical evaluation and care.