Objective
Our aim was to conduct an up-to-date systematic review of randomised controlled trials (RCTs) to determine the benefits and harms of enhanced recovery after surgery (ERAS) programme in ...bariatric surgery.
Methods
MEDLINE, Embase, PubMed, CINAHL and the Cochrane Library were searched for RCTs on ERAS versus standard care (SC) until April 2020. The primary endpoint was the length of hospital stay (LOS).
Results
Five RCTs included a total of 610 procedures. ERAS adoption is capable of significantly reducing LOS (MD of − 0.51; 95% CI − 0.92 to − 0.10;
P
= 0.01) and postoperative nausea and vomiting (PONV) (OR 0.42; 95% CI 0.19 to 0.95;
P
= 0.04). No significant differences in terms of adverse events and readmissions.
Conclusions
The implementation of ERAS in bariatric surgery produces a significant reduction in LOS and PONV.
In the West, more than one third of newly diagnosed subjects show metastatic disease in gastric cancer (mGC) with few care options available. Gastrectomy has recently become a subject of debate, with ...some evidence showing advantages in survival beyond the sole purpose of treatment tumor-related complications. We investigated the survival benefit of different strategies in mGC patients, focusing on the role and timing of gastrectomy. Data were extracted from the SEER database. Groups were determined according to whether patients received gastrectomy, chemotherapy, supportive care. Patients receiving a multimodality treatment were further divided according to timing of surgery, whether performed before (primary gastrectomy, PG) or after chemotherapy (secondary gastrectomy, SG). 16,596 patients were included. Median OS was significantly higher (p < 0.001) in the SG (15 months) than in the PG (13 months), gastrectomy alone (6 months), and chemotherapy (7 months) groups. In the multivariate analysis, SG showed better OS (HR = 0.22, 95%CI = 0.18-0.26, p < 0.001) than PG (HR = 0.25, 95%CI = 0.23-0.28, p < 0.001), gastrectomy (HR = 0.40, 95%CI = 0.36-0.44, p < 0.001), and chemotherapy (HR = 0.42, 95%CI = 0.4-0.44, p < 0.001). The survival benefits persisted even after the PSM analysis. This study shows survival advantages of gastrectomy as multimodality strategy after chemotherapy. In selected patients, SG can be proposed to improve the management of stage IV disease.
The evidence regarding the effectiveness and safety of laparoscopic sleeve gastrectomy (LSG) has been mostly based on the data derived from nonrandomized studies. The objective of this study was to ...evaluate the outcomes of LSG and to present an up-to-date review of the available evidence based on the recent publications of new randomized, controlled trials (RCTs).
PubMed, Embase, and Cochrane Central Register of Controlled Trials were searched until November 2012 for RCTs on LSG.
Fifteen RCTs, comprising a total of 1191 patients, of whom 795 had undergone LSG, were included. No patient required conversion to open surgery for LSG, laparoscopic gastric bypass (LGB), or laparoscopic adjustable gastric banding (LAGB) procedures. There were no deaths, and the complication rate was 12.1% (range 10%-13.2%) in the LSG group versus 20.9% (range 10%-26.4%) in the LGB group, and 0% in the LAGB group (only 1 RCT). The complications included leakage, bleeding, stricture, and reoperation that occurred with rates of .9%, 3.3%, 0%, and 2.1%, respectively, in the LSG group and rates of 0%, 5%, 0%, and 4%, respectively, in the LGB group. The average operating time in the LSG group was 106.5 minutes versus 132.3 minutes in the LGB group. The percentage of excess weight loss (%EWL) ranged from 49% to 81% in the LSG group, from 62.1% to 94.4% in the LGB group, and from 28.7% to 48% in the LAGB group, with a follow-up ranging from 6 months to 3 years. The type 2 diabetes mellitus (T2DM) remission rate ranged from 26.5% to 75% in the LSG group and from 42% to 93% in the LGB group.
LSG is a well-tolerated, feasible procedure with a relatively short operating time. Its effectiveness in terms of weight loss is confirmed for short-term follow-up (≤ 3 years). The role of LSG in the treatment of T2DM requires further investigation.
Background
Inadequate sampling of lymph nodes could lead to stage migration and indicate a poor prognosis for gastric cancer after curative surgery. Some emerging novel predictors and the application ...of a nomogram could increase the accuracy of survival prediction.
Methods
An international database regarding gastric cancer was employed as the primary cohort. The patients with inadequate (< 30) lymph nodes (LN) were analyzed by Cox proportional hazards regression. Based on the selected model, a nomogram was plotted and calibrated against an external validation database.
Results
A total of 1109 patients were included in the primary cohort, and there were 6584 patients in the validation cohort. There were significant differences regarding the clinical characteristics between the two cohorts. The model containing age, T stages, N stages, metastatic lymph nodes (mLN), and the number of total LN retrieved (TLN) showed superiority over the conventional TNM stages. Harrell's concordance index of the nomogram and TNM stages was 0.744 and 0.717, respectively. The external validation demonstrated a good concordance with the nomogram-predicted survival.
Conclusions
The nomogram including age, T stages, N stages, mLN, and TLN had a better accuracy than the conventional TNM staging system in predicting overall survival for gastric cancer patients with inadequate (< 30) LN.
Abstract Introduction Colorectal carcinoma can present with acute intestinal obstruction in 7%–30% of cases, especially if tumor is located at or distal to the splenic flexure. In these cases, ...emergency surgical decompression becomes mandatory as the traditional treatment option. It involves defunctioning stoma with or without primary resection of obstructing tumor. An alternative to surgery is endoluminal decompression. The aim of this review is to assess the effectiveness of colonic stents, used as a bridge to surgery, in the management of malignant left colonic and rectal obstruction. Methods We considered only randomized trials which compared stent vs surgery for intestinal obstruction from left sided colorectal cancer (as a bridge to surgery) irrespective of their size. No language or publication status restrictions were imposed. A systematic search was conducted in Medline, Cochrane Central Register of Controlled Trials and the Science Citation Index (from inception to December 2011) Results We identified 3109 citations through our electronic search and 3 through other sources. Initial screening of the titles and abstracts resulted in the exclusion of 3104 citations. A further 5 citations were excluded after detailed screening of full articles. Three published studies were included in this systematic review. A total of 197 patients were included in our analysis, 97 of them had colorectal stent vs 100 who had emergency surgery. Clinical success has been defined in different manners. In included trials the clinical success rate was significantly higher in the emergency surgery group (99%) compared with the stent group (52.5%) ( p < 0.00001). There was no difference in the overall complication rate in the stent group (48.5%) vs emergency surgery group (51%) ( p = 0.86). There was no difference in 30-days postoperative mortality ( p = 0.97). The overall survival was analyzed in none trial. When used as a bridge to surgery, colorectal stents provide some advantages: the primary anastomosis rate was significantly higher in the stent group (64.9%) vs emergency surgery group (55%) ( p = 0.003); the overall stoma rate was significantly lower in the stent group (45.3%) compared with the emergency surgery group (62%) ( p = 0.02). There were no significant differences between the two groups as to permanent stoma rate (46.7% in stent group vs 51.8% in surgical group, p = 0.56), anastomotic leakage rate (9% in stent group vs 3.7% in surgical group, p = 0.35) and intra-abdominal abscess rate (5.1% in stent group vs 4.9% in surgical group, p = 0.97). Conclusion Although colonic stenting appears to be an effective treatment of malignant large bowel obstruction, the clinical success resulted significantly higher in the emergency surgery group without any advantages in terms of overall complication rate and 30-days postoperative mortality. On the other hand, the colonic stenting as a bridge to surgery provides surgical advantages, as higher primary anastomosis rate and a lower overall stoma rate, without increasing the risk of anastomotic leak or intra-abdominal abscess. However, these results should be interpreted with caution because few studies reported data on these outcomes. Due to the small and variable sample size of the included trials, further RCTs are needed including a larger number of patients and evaluating long term results (overall survival and quality of life) and cost-effectiveness analysis.
The aim of this systematic review and meta-analysis is to compare robotic colectomy (RC) with laparoscopic colectomy (LC) in terms of intraoperative and postoperative outcomes.
A systematic ...literature search was performed to retrieve comparative studies of robotic and laparoscopic colectomy. The databases searched were PubMed, Embase and the Cochrane Central Register of Controlled Trials from January 2000 to October 2014. The Odds ratio, Risk difference and Mean difference were used as the summary statistics.
A total of 12 studies, which included a total of 4,148 patients who had undergone robotic or laparoscopic colectomy, were included and analyzed. RC demonstrated a longer operative time (MD 41.52, P<0.00001) and higher cost (MD 2.42, P<0.00001) than did LC. The time to first flatus passage (MD -0.51, P = 0.003) and the length of hospital stay (MD -0.68, P = 0.01) were significantly shorter after RC. Additionally, the intraoperative blood loss (MD -16.82, P<0.00001) was significantly less in RC. There was also a significantly lower incidence of overall postoperative complications (OR 0.74, P = 0.02) and wound infections (RD -0.02, P = 0.03) after RC. No differences in the postoperative ileus, in the anastomotic leak, or in the conversion to open surgery rate and in the number of harvested lymph nodes outcomes were found between the approaches.
The present meta-analysis, mainly based on observational studies, suggests that RC is more time-consuming and expensive than laparoscopy but that it results in faster recovery of bowel function, a shorter hospital stay, less blood loss and lower rates of both overall postoperative complications and wound infections.
To investigate the role of minimally invasive surgery for gastric cancer and determine surgical, clinical, and oncological outcomes.
This is a propensity score-matched case-control study, comparing ...three treatment arms: robotic gastrectomy (RG), laparoscopic gastrectomy (LG), open gastrectomy (OG). Data collection started after sharing a specific study protocol. Data were recorded through a tailored and protected web-based system. Primary outcomes: harvested lymph nodes, estimated blood loss, hospital stay, complications rate. Among the secondary outcomes, there are: operative time, R0 resections, POD of mobilization, POD of starting liquid diet and soft solid diet. The analysis includes the evaluation of type and grade of postoperative complications. Detailed information of anastomotic leakages is also provided.
The present analysis was carried out of 1026 gastrectomies. To guarantee homogenous distribution of cases, patients in the RG, LG and OG groups were 1:1:2 matched using a propensity score analysis with a caliper = 0.2. The successful matching resulted in a total sample of 604 patients (RG = 151; LG = 151; OG = 302). The three groups showed no differences in all baseline patients characteristics, type of surgery (
= 0.42) and stage of the disease (
= 0.16). Intraoperative blood loss was significantly lower in the LG (95.93 ± 119.22) and RG (117.91 ± 68.11) groups compared to the OG (127.26 ± 79.50,
= 0.002). The mean number of retrieved lymph nodes was similar between the RG (27.78 ± 11.45), LG (24.58 ± 13.56) and OG (25.82 ± 12.07) approach. A benefit in favor of the minimally invasive approaches was found in the length of hospital stay (
< 0.0001). A similar complications rate was found (
= 0.13). The leakage rate was not different (
= 0.78) between groups.
Laparoscopic and robotic surgery can be safely performed and proposed as possible alternative to open surgery. The main highlighted benefit is a faster postoperative functional recovery.
Abstract Nowadays left colon and rectal cancer treatment has been well standardized in both open and laparoscopy. Nevertheless, the level of the ligation of the inferior mesenteric artery (IMA), at ...the origin from the aorta (high tie) or below the origin of the left colic artery (low tie), is still debated. The objective of the systematic review is to evaluate the current scientific evidence of high versus low tie of the IMA in colorectal cancer surgery. The outcomes considered were overall 30-days postoperative morbidity, overall 30-days postoperative mortality, anastomotic leakage, 5-years survival rate, and overall recurrence rate. A total of 8.666 patients were included in our analysis, 4.281 forming the group undergoing high tie versus 4.385 patients undergoing low tie. Neither the high tie nor the low tie strategy showed an evidence based success, as no statistically significant differences were identified for all outcomes measured. Future high powered and well designed randomized clinical trials are needed to draw definitive conclusion on this dilemma.
Purpose
To perform an up-to-date meta-analysis of randomized controlled trials (RCTs) comparing pancreaticojejunostomy (PJ) and pancreaticogastrostomy (PG) in order to determine the safer anastomotic ...technique. Compared to existing meta-analysis, new RCTs were evaluated and subgroup analyses of different anastomotic techniques were carried out.
Methods
We conducted a bibliographic research using the National Library of Medicine’s PubMed database from January 1990 to July 2015 of RCTs. Only RCTs, in English, that compared PG versus all types of PJ were selected. Data were independently extracted by two authors. We performed a quantitative systematic review following the guidelines of the Preferred Reporting Items for Systematic Reviews and Meta-Analyses statement. A random-effect model was applied. Statistical heterogeneity was assessed using the
I
2
and
χ
2
tests. Primary outcomes were rate of overall and clinically significant pancreatic fistula (POPF).
Results
Ten RCTs were identified including 1629 patients, 826 undergoing PG and 803 undergoing PJ. RCTs showed significant heterogeneity regarding definitions of POPF, perioperative management, and characteristics of pancreatic gland. No significant differences were found in the rate of overall and clinically significant POPF, morbidity, mortality, reoperation, and intra-abdominal sepsis when PG was compared with all types PJ or when subgroup analysis (double-layer PG with or without anterior gastrotomy versus duct to mucosa PJ and single-layer PG versus single-layer end-to-end/end-to-side PJ) were analyzed.
Conclusions
PG is not superior to PJ in the prevention of POPF. Current RCTs have major methodological limitations with significant heterogeneity in regard to surgical techniques, definition of POPF/complications, and perioperative management.