Abstract
Objectives This article describes the clinical outcomes after thymectomy in patients with thymomatous myasthenia gravis (T-MG) managed in the department of thoracic surgery of Hassan II University Hospital of Fez, Fez, Morocco. Materials and Methods We performed a retrospective analysis of medical records of 16 patients with T-MG between January 2009 and January 2017. Results There were 11 women and 5 men with a median age of 40 years at the thymectomy time and a median time of onset of symptoms to thymectomy of 12 months. At the preoperative evaluation (Myasthenia Gravis Foundation of America [MGFA] clinical classification), 7 patients were class II, 7 class III, and 2 class IV. Nine patients were in Masaoka stage I, and the remaining 7 patients stage II. We recorded one case of postoperative myasthenic crisis. At 3 years of follow-up after thymectomy, 6 patients had complete stable remission and the other 10 patients improved. Of these patients with clinical improvement, 6 patients were in MGFA class I and the remaining 4 patients class II. Conclusion The present study shows the beneficial effect of thymectomy in patients with T-MG. Postoperative clinical outcomes seem to be better when the preoperative severity of myasthenic symptoms is mild (MGFA class II).
Copyright
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This is an open-access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution-Non Commercial-No Derivatives License, which permits unrestricted reproduction and distribution, for non-commercial purposes only; and use and reproduction, but not distribution, of adapted material for non-commercial purposes only, provided the original work is properly cited.
