Video-assisted thoracoscopic surgery (VATS) is a safe and effective surgical approach for pulmonary resection. VATS can be accomplished with only a single incision, resulting in less postoperative ...pain and paresthesia, better cosmetic results, and greater patient satisfaction. Single-port VATS (spVATS) has become increasingly common for lung resection. We assess the early surgical and oncological outcomes after adopting this new technique at our tertiary cancer center as the first institution to do so in the country.
Medical records for 257 patients in a tertiary cancer center, with a diagnosis of non-small cell lung cancer, pulmonary metastasis, or other chest-confined pathology, were accessed to obtain perioperative outcomes, pathologic results, post-operative follow-up data, and early surgical and oncological outcomes. All patients underwent spVATS for limited or major lung resection. Simple descriptive analysis was utilized.
spVATS was either performed with curative intent (79.8%, N = 205), or as a diagnostic procedure (20.2%, N = 52). Resection types were subcategorized for curative intent group as limited (73.6%, N = 151), lobectomy (16.6%, N = 34), and complex (9.7%, N = 20). Resection with a negative margin (R0) rate was 100% for the primary lung cancer (PLC) patients and 97% for the pulmonary metastasectomy (PM) group. The complication rate was 5%. Three-year disease-free survival was 87% and 68.5% for PLC and PM group, respectively. The 3-year overall-survival was 91.3% for the PLC and 82.8% for PM. Operation duration showed a downtrend over the study period in each curative subcategory with a borderline difference in the limited resection (P value = 0.05).
All the spVATS procedures were successfully performed without perioperative severe complications or mortality, regardless of complexity. R0 resection was excellent. Middle- and long-term efficacies of spVATS for lung cancer require further follow-up. With proper training, appropriate indication and meticulous application, adopting spVATS is safe and feasible technique that does not compromise surgical and oncological outcomes.
Malignant peripheral nerve sheath tumor is a rare and aggressive form of sarcoma that arises from a peripheral nerve, mostly in association with neurofibromatosis type 1. Half of the cases were ...reported in the extremities, with the lungs being the most common site of metastasis. We report a rare case of successful limb salvage surgery performed for a large exophytic malignant peripheral nerve sheath tumor of the right forearm with wide surgical margins followed by split-thickness skin graft and later a flexor carpi radialis tendon transfer to extensor digitorum communis tendon.
A 51-year-old Bedouin Arabic man presented to our institution with an incompletely excised, large, fungating, malignant peripheral nerve sheath tumor occupying most of his right forearm. Staging imaging showed multiple lung nodules. He underwent wide local excision followed by skin graft and tendon transfer as a palliative measure to preserve the function of his dominant limb. The operation was performed without any complications, and the patient had an excellent postoperative result. Afterward, he was started on multiple lines of chemotherapy that failed because of disease progression, and the patient died 7 months after the operation.
Clinicians must consider the possibility of soft tissue sarcoma even in a patient with a small, slow-growing, superficial mass. Furthermore, a wrong open biopsy or nononcological surgical procedure may lead to possible contamination and ultimately a more radical procedure than would have originally been necessary, where this can be prevented by an early referral to a highly specialized sarcoma center.
Pulmonary metastasectomy was performed in the early twentieth century and ever since, it has evolved to be one of the main treatment options for certain metastatic malignancies. The advancement of ...minimally invasive procedures enabled new techniques to minimize morbidity and improve patient quality of care and overall outcome.
Herein we present three patients, aged 53, 48, and 27 years, known to have sigmoid, rectal, and non-seminomatous germ cell tumors respectively. All patients were diagnosed to have metastatic lung nodules and underwent laparotomy to excise abdominal tumors followed by trans-diaphragmatic single-port video-assisted thoracoscopic pulmonary metastasectomy. All patients achieved complete surgical tumor excision, and none had pulmonary related complications on follow-up.
Our prescribed novel trans-diaphragmatic single-port video-assisted thoracoscopic surgery (VATS) technique for synchronous pulmonary metastasectomy and intra-abdominal tumor resection is safe and can achieve complete resection with negative margins.
Paragangliomas are rare endocrine tumors that arise from the extra-adrenal autonomic paraganglia and sympathetic paragangliomas usually secret catecholamines and are located in the sympathetic ...paravertebral ganglia of thorax, abdomen, and pelvis. In contrast, most parasympathetic paragangliomas are nonfunctional and located along the glossopharyngeal and vagal nerves in the neck and at the base of the skull. Such neoplasms, although rare, are clinically important because they may recur after surgical resection and 10% of them give rise to metastases causing death with the lymphatic nodes, bones, liver, and lungs being the most common locations.
We present a case of a 26-year-old male patient that was diagnosed with paraganglioma of the right-frontal lobe infiltrating the falx and frontal bone which was diagnosed after suffering from a headache and abnormal vision. On initial work-up he was found to have right pulmonary nodules that increased in size after follow up and other nodules appeared in the contralateral lung. He underwent subtotal resection of the brain tumor and complete resection of the bilateral pulmonary nodules.
To our knowledge, paraganglioma is considered to be a rare entity in the central nervous system with very few cases being reported in the supratentorial region and no cases were reported of metastatic such paraganglioma to the lung.
Background
Urachal anomalies (UAs) are rare in children; the most encountered are urachal cysts, urachal sinus, and urachal diverticulum. Other associated anomalies have been reported to include ...renal and abdominal wall defects. No skeletal anomalies have been reported to date.
Case presentation
We present a case of a 20-month-old female patient, who presented to our emergency department with a fever of 2 weeks duration associated with colicky abdominal pain, a tender abdomen, and an infraumbilical mass. The suspicion of urachal sinus abscess was confirmed by ultrasound. The patient was also found to have a single left kidney and multiple vertebral segmental anomalies on a full-body computed tomography scan. The patient underwent open surgical excision of the urachal abscess without complications on follow-up.
Conclusion
Urachal abscess is rare in children. Associated anomalies include renal and abdominal wall defects. To our knowledge and based on our meticulous search through the literature, this is the first case to report a combination of renal and skeletal findings in a child. Whenever a urachal remnant is found in a patient, a radiological investigation should be made to rule out associated anomalies.
Ventricular rupture is rarely described in the literature outside the context of myocardial infarction, infection or neoplasm. It is associated with a high mortality rate due to late presentation and ...delayed surgical intervention, which involves sutureless or sutured techniques. Comprehensive literature review failed to identify any case of intra-operative right ventricular heart rupture followed by myocardial repair and a complete recovery after a prolonged intensive care unit (ICU) stay.
A 57-year-old previously healthy gentleman presented complaining of a new onset shortness of breath for 2 months. A large mediastinal mass was found on chest imaging and biopsy revealed a thymoma. Patient received a neoadjuvant Cisplatin/Doxorubicin/Cyclophosphamide (CAP) regimen chemotherapy then sternotomy and thymectomy en bloc with anterior pericardium. Post-thymectomy, the patient continued to be hypotensive in recovery despite aggressive fluid resuscitation. He was sent back to theatre, aggressive fluid resuscitation continued, surgical site exploration was done by reopening the sternum, and the bleeding source was identified and controlled, but intraoperative asystole developed. During internal cardiac massage, the right ventricle ruptured with a 3 cm defect which was successfully repaired using a pericardial patch without a bypass machine due to unavailability at our cancer center. The patient remained dependent on mechanical ventilation through tracheostomy for a total of 2 months due to bilateral phrenic nerve paralysis, was discharged from ICU to the surgical floor 66 days after the operation and weaned off ventilator support after 85 days, adequate respiratory and physical rehabilitation followed. Patient is doing very well now with excellent performance, and free of tumor recurrence 30 months after surgery.
Right ventricular rupture is rarely described outside the context of myocardial infarction and valvular heart disease. Tumor proximity to the heart and neoadjuvant cardiotoxic chemotherapy are the proposed causes for precipitating the cardiac rupture in our case. Post-surgical patients who receive early physical rehabilitation and respiratory physiotherapy have improved survival and outcome.
Whenever partial hand amputations for soft tissue sarcomas are attempted, special consideration should be given to achieve a balance between complete resection associated with negative margins and ...preservation of functionality to the patient so that the hand can support the contralateral intact hand for bimanual activities. This difficult decision is even more challenging within the limited anatomical confines of the hand. Based on our literature review, this is the first case of double central 3rd and 4th ray amputation, as far as we know with good hand function, evaluated by the Musculoskeletal Tumor Rating Scale.
Postoperative pulmonary complications can be a major catastrophic consequence of major surgeries and can lead to increased morbidity, mortality, hospital stay, and cost. Many protocols have been ...tried to reduce serious adverse outcomes with effective strategies including a bundle of preoperative, intraoperative and postoperative techniques. Using these techniques maybe challenging in developing countries with limited resources even in specialized centers.
A before-and-after trial comparing our data from the national surgical quality improvement program (NSQIP) based on their reports. Data was collected prospectively for the patients who underwent major surgeries at King Hussein Cancer Center during the year 2017 when the use of the perioperative pulmonary care bundle was mandatory to all surgery teams and compared it with the data collected retrospectively for the patients who underwent the same type of surgeries in the year 2016 when the use of such a bundle was optional. The primary end point is the decrease in incidence of postoperative pulmonary complications. Simple descriptive statistical analysis was used to obtain results.
The potential risk factors for postoperative pulmonary complications for 1665 patients divided into 2 groups (2016 vs. 2017); 764 (45.9%) vs. 901 (54.1%), respectively. There were no significant differences regarding gender (male 46.7% vs. 46.4%, P value = 0.891, female 53.3% vs. 53.6%, P value = 0.39), mean of age (53.5 year vs. 5.28 year, P value = 0.296), mean of body mass index (BMI) (28.6 vs. 6%, 28.6, P value = 0.95), smoking status; (69.6% vs. 65.1%, P value = 0.052), ventilator use (0.3% vs. 0.4% P value = 0.693) and chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (1.4% vs. 1.4 with, P value = 0.996).The data showed a significant reduction in postoperative pneumonia between the 2 groups (2016 vs. 2017) (2.7% vs. 0.9%, P value = 0.004) and showed a significant reduction in unplanned intubation, 1.4% in 2016 vs. 0.7% in 2017.
The standardization of perioperative pulmonary care bundle, including smoking cessation, perioperative pulmonary interventions and early mobilization, significantly reduces the incidence of postoperative pulmonary complications in cancer patients. This technique's implementation was feasible easily even with limited resources in a developing country like Jordan.
BACKGROUNDAn extremely rare manifestation of perigraft seroma (PGS), in which a dense, semisolid jelly-like mass had formed around the shunt instead of the standard fluid-like form of the usual ...seroma, leading to misdiagnosis with other entities, such as tumors around the synthetic arterio-venous shunt (AVS) was presented. CASE REPORTA 64-year-old male with multiple myeloma post autologous bone marrow transplant with a renal impairment, presented with a rare form of PGS, which was noticed 2 months after placing a synthetic AVS vascular graft. The mass increased in size, and multiple attempts for excision failed due to recurrence, which led to tumor misdiagnosis. The mass reoccurrence stopped completely only after the radical shunt removal. CONCLUSIONThis case report revealed a rare form of PGS, in which the seroma was represented as a firm, semisolid jelly-like mass rather than the typical fluid type transudate seroma. Despite its rarity, it was associated with a high recurrence rate because unlike the standard perishunt seroma, this semisolid jelly-like material could neither be aspirated, nor could it be resected en-bloc, leading to shunting dysfunction. Its management included advanced imaging and a high probability of shunt removal or replacement.