Dr. Payne’s main interest is in the diagnosis and treatment of tumours of the thyroid gland. He has a high volume thyroid cancer surgery practise at the McGill University teaching hospitals. At the national level, Dr. Payne is the Director of the Endocrine Surgery Group for the Canadian Society of Otolaryngology – Head and Neck Surgery. He is actively involved in publishing research studies and at presenting this work annually at national and international conferences. He has been one of the pioneers in the development of the sentinel lymph node biopsy technique for thyroid gland malignancies. He has published in both North America and Europe on this novel procedure. Dr. Payne is also certified by the American College of Surgeons to perform ultrasound guided biopsies of thyroid nodules.