Objective To compare the clinical therapeutic effects of thyroid endoscopic surgery and traditional open surgery in treatment of thyroid diseases.Methods Data of 136 patients undergoing thyroid surgery from May.2011 to May.2012 in the Second People's Hospital of Yunnan Province were collected.They were randomly divided into 2 groups:the observation group (n =68) and the control group (n =68).The observation group were treated with endoscopic thyroid surgery and the control group with the traditional surgery.Clinical data of the 2 groups such as operation time,intraoperative blood loss,postoperative drainage volume,postoperative serum interleukin 2 (IL-2),C reaction protein(CRP),TNF-αexpression level,postoperative complications,postoperative hospital stay and so on were collected and compared.Results The difference had no statistical significance between the 2 groups in the operation time,intraoperative blood loss,postoperative drainage volume,postoperative serum IL-2,CRP,TNF-αexpression levels,and postoperative complications (P ＞ 0.05).However,the observation group had superiority in the postoperative hospital stay,neck discomfort and the acceptability than the control group.The difference had statistical significance (P ＜ 0.05).Conclusions Endoscopic thyroid surgery is safe and reliable.Compared with traditional open surgery,it has better cosmetic effects and less trauma.