Daniel W. Karakla MD, FACS

In 1993, when Dr. Daniel Karakla completed his residency in otolaryngology at Naval Medical Center Portsmouth, there were two options open to patients with laryngeal cancer: largyngectomy (either partial or total) or radiotherapy. Chemotherapy at that time was generally only for palliation. “Between World War I and World War II, radiation therapy was used broadly for head and neck cancer patients,” Dr. Karakla says. “And as chemotherapy agents improved, that modality became a stronger part of the treatment.”

Today, the pendulum is swinging more and more back toward surgery, he notes, because different surgical innovations and reconstruction techniques offer patients hope for a more normal quality of life. Many of those innovations, described herein, were brought to EVMS by Dr. Karakla.