Head and Neck Surgeon
West Cancer Center
Dr. Courtney Shires is a Head & Neck Surgeon at West Cancer Center & Research Institute in Memphis, TN. She treats patients at West with cancers and benign tumors of the thyroid, parathyroid, skin, and the upper aerodigestive tract.
These types of cancers cannot be hidden, Shires says, as the patients have trouble swallowing, talking, and breathing. It’s their willingness to fight back that inspires her.
Shires’ journey to medicine — and such specialized medicine — began years earlier in car rides from her childhood home in Jackson, Mississippi, to Memphis. She had several serious ear infections growing up, was hospitalized on multiple occasions with mastoiditis, and had several ear surgeries. So, even as a small child, “I wanted to be an otolaryngologist to help people like myself.”
With a bachelor’s degree from Mississippi College, Shires earned her Doctor of Medicine from the University of Mississippi School of Medicine. Her turn to otolaryngology came as a resident at the University of Tennessee Health Science Center in Memphis, intrigued by the surgeries and treatment options available for head and neck cancers.
An interest in robotic surgery for head and neck cancer, skull base surgery, and microvascular reconstruction took Shires to the University of Pennsylvania for fellowship training in Head & Neck Surgical Oncology. She brought her advanced training back to Memphis initially to join the faculty at University of Tennessee prior to joining the multidisciplinary team at West Cancer Center & Research Institute.
Dr. Shires serves as faculty in the General Surgery residency program at Baptist Memorial Hospital in Memphis, TN, serving as a teacher and mentor for young surgeons learning endocrine surgery of the head & neck.