Is there still a role for laparoscopy combined with laparoscopic ultrasonography in the staging of pancreatic cancer?

Purpose  

This study was designed to compare our laparoscopic ultrasonography (LUS) experience in the resectability evaluation of pancreatic or periampullary cancers (PAC) in two different periods: before and after the introduction of multidetector CT (MDCT).     

Is there a safe advantage in performing outpatient laparoscopic cholecystectomy in children?

Background

Laparoscopic cholecystectomy, the standard procedure for removing the sick gallbladder of children, is generally performed leaving the child overnight in the hospital.

Purpose

This study aimed to determine if there is a safe advantage in performing laparoscopic cholecystectomy as an outpatient procedure while setting the clinical parameters for those who will benefit from in-hospital stay.

Methods

Thirty-five patients were selected for the study and were divided into group A, if the outpatient procedure was done, and group B, if the child was left overnight in the hospital. Retrospective review of medical charts was performed. Statistical significance was defined as P < .05.

Results

Group A consisted of 13 patients and group B of 22 patients. All patients in group A left the hospital the same day of surgery. Distribution by age and sex in the groups was not statistically different. Preoperative symptoms of vomiting were statistically significantly higher in group B. Presence of an associated medical condition was higher in the in-hospital patients. Concomitant procedures, blood loss estimates, and duration of surgery showed no statistical difference. No child was readmitted after release from the hospital. Pre-, intra-, and postoperative pain management were the same in all patients. Mean postoperative stay and medical charges were statistically significant between the groups.

Conclusions

Laparoscopic cholecystectomy can safely be done as an outpatient procedure. Children with a complicated gallbladder disease process or associated medical condition benefit from an overnight stay. Perioperative pain management is crucial in all cases. Reduced hospital stay and medical charges are significant advantages in performing laparoscopic cholecystectomy as an outpatient procedure.     

Is there an optimal time for laparoscopic cholecystectomy in acute cholecystitis?

Background Laparoscopic cholecystectomy (LC) is safe in acute cholecystitis, but the exact timing remains ill-defined. This study evaluated the effect of timing of LC in patients with acute cholecystitis. Methods Prospective data from the hospital registry were reviewed. All patients admitted with acute cholecystitis from June 1994 to January 2004 were included in the cohort. Results Laparoscopic cholecystectomy was attempted in 1,967 patients during the study period; 80% were women, mean patient age was 44 years (range, 20–73 years). Of the 1,967 LC procedures, 1,675 were successful, and 292 were converted to an open procedure (14%). Mean operating time for LC was 1 h 44 min (SD ± 50 min), versus 3 h 5 min (SD ± 79 min) when converted to an open procedure. Average postoperative length of stay was 1.89 days (± 2.47 days) for the laparoscopic group and 4.3 days (± 2.2 days) for the conversion group. No clinically relevant differences regarding conversion rates, operative times, or postoperative length of stay were found between patients who were operated on within 48 h compared to those patients who were operated on post-admission days 3–7. Conclusions The timing of laparoscopic cholecystectomy in patients with acute cholecystitis has no clinically relevant effect on conversion rates, operative times, or length of stay.     

Is larger tumor size a contraindication to retroperitoneal laparoscopic adrenalectomy?

Purpose

To evaluate the surgical feasibility of retroperitoneal laparoscopic adrenalectomy for tumors exceeding 5 cm.

Methods

A retrospective review was carried out on all adrenalectomies performed between 2002 and 2011. All surgical procedures were performed or supervised by one of two experienced laparoscopic surgeons. A total of 133 patients who underwent retroperitoneal laparoscopic adrenalectomy were divided according to tumor size: group I (n = 57) had tumors <5 cm and group II (n = 76) had tumors ≥5 cm. The operative outcomes included surgical time, change in hemoglobin level, estimated blood loss, necessity for blood transfusion, time to ambulation, hospitalization duration, postoperative complications according to the Clavien-Dindo classification, and the rate of conversion to open surgery.

Results

The estimated blood loss (271.75 ± 232.98 mL vs. 367.24 ± 275.11 mL; p = 0.037), time to ambulation (1.60 ± 0.49 days vs. 1.89 ± 0.31 days; p = 0.001), and postoperative hospitalization (7.88 ± 3.08 days vs. 9.264 ± 3.10 days; p = 0.012) were significantly higher in group II. The operation time and hemoglobin level change were not statistically different between groups. Blood transfusions were performed in 3 patients from group I and 6 patients from group II (5.3 vs. 7.9 %; p = 0.449). No patients experienced conversion to open surgery.

Conclusions

Retroperitoneal laparoscopic adrenalectomy can be used in patients with tumors larger than 5 cm.     

Axillary ultrasound for preoperative nodal staging in breast cancer patients: Is it of added value?

BackgroundNew insights show that an axillary lymph node dissection (ALND) may not always be indicated for metastases detected by ultrasound (pathologically proven). This study investigated whether axillary ultrasound accurately predicts pN0, pN1 and pN2–pN3 status.MethodsData were retrospectively collected from all consecutive patients with invasive breast cancer who underwent (primary) surgery between 2008 and 2012. False negative percentages and negative predictive values (NPVs) for sonographic nodal staging were calculated for all patients and again for cT1–2 patients treated by breast conserving therapy (BCT).ResultsA total of 577 axillary ultrasounds were included. After negative ultrasound findings (cN0), pathology showed pN2–pN3 disease in 4.4% of these cases, with an NPV of 95.5% (93.4–97.1%). When cN1 (1–3 suspicious nodes) was predicted, pathology showed pN2–pN3 disease in 41.2%, with an NPV of 58.5% (44.2–71.5%).In the subgroup of patients with cT1–2 breast cancer that were treated by BCT, pathology showed pN2–pN3 disease in 2.3% after negative ultrasound findings (cN0), with an NPV of 97.7% (94.9–99.0%). When cN1 was predicted (n = 12), pathology showed pN2–pN3 disease in 50.0%, with an NPV of 50.0% (22.3–77.9%). A direct ALND was performed in these 12 cN1 cases; pathology showed six patients with pN1 (three patients with one and three with two macrometastases) and six with pN2–pN3 disease (4, 5, 11, 13, 16 or 22 macrometastases, respectively).ConclusionIn conclusion, a negative axillary ultrasound generally excludes the presence of pN2–pN3 disease. An axillary ultrasound cannot accurately differentiate between pN1 and pN2–pN3. It could be argued that the standard performance of an axillary ultrasound in breast cancer patients is questionable; multidisciplinary discussion could guide decisions on the use of axillary ultrasound for the individual patient.     

Is laparoscopic appendectomy safe in pregnant women?

apd: 6 February 2001     

Is laparoscopic cholecystectomy cheaper?

As laparoscopic cholecystectomy is being used more and more frequently, a cost analysis was aimed to be performed to evaluate cost effectiveness in Turkey. Records of 376 patients who underwent cholecystectomy by various methods were analyzed retrospectively. Mean duration of postoperative hospital stay was 5.1 +/- 2.6 days for the open cholecystectomy group (OC group), composed of 177 patients; 5.6 +/- 2.1 days for the converted open cholecystectomy group (CC group) composed of 15 patients; and 2.5 +/- 1.8 days for the laparoscopic cholecystectomy group (LC group), which included 184 patients. The mean cost per patient was 778 dollars +/- 75, 1964 dollars +/- 82, and 2357 dollars +/- 80 for the OC, LC, and CC groups, respectively. It was concluded that laparoscopic cholecystectomy will gain economic feasibility over conventional cholecystectomy in our country only when costs of laparoscopic equipment lower and personnel wages increase sufficiently.     

Is laparoscopic cholecystectomy more challenging in male patients?

Background  

Laparoscopic cholecystectomy (LC) seems to be more challenging in males than in females. The surgery seems to be longer in male patients. There also seems to be an increased rate of conversion to open surgery in male patients. We sought to objectively verify this widespread belief.     

Is there a role for drain use in elective laparoscopic cholecystectomy? A controlled randomized trial

Background

Although the issue of drain use in open cholecystectomy has been adequately addressed by prospective randomized trials, there is lack of evidence on the usefulness of drains in elective laparoscopic cholecystectomy, and the surgeons follow their beliefs and bias on this debate. Therefore, a controlled randomized trial was designed to assess the value of drains in elective laparoscopic cholecystectomy.

Methods

During a 5-year period (January 2002 to December 2006), 284 patients were randomized to have a drain placed (group A), whereas 281 patients were randomized not to have a drain (group B) placed in the subhepatic space. End points of this trial were to detect any differences in morbidity, postoperative pain, and hospital stay between the 2 groups.

Results

There was no mortality in either group and no statistically significant difference in morbidity or hospital stay between the 2 groups. However, postoperative pain was significantly increased in patients who had a drain placed; median visual analog scale (VAS) score was 5 (range 1 to 8) versus 3 (range 1 to 8), in the non-drained group (P < .0001). Interestingly, in 2 of 3 patients in whom a drain was placed against randomization because of bile leak suspicion, a bile leak occurred.

Conclusions

The routine use of a drain in elective laparoscopic cholecystectomy has nothing to offer; in contrast, it is associated with increased pain. It would be reasonable, however, to leave a drain if there is a worry about an unsolved or potential bile leak, bearing in mind that drain placement, although sometimes providing a false sense of security, does not guarantee either prevention or treatment of postoperative bile collections, bleeding, or bile peritonitis.     

Is ultrasound essential for regional anesthesia in children?

According to systematic reviews performed on adults, ultrasound provides moderate advantages in latency time reduction and block quality. Whether it really reduces the number of complications at the expense of less vascular puncturing, less diaphragm paralysis, and less pleural puncturing, together with lower doses of local anesthetic used, is a controversial question. Neither is there evidence that ultrasound achieves a higher rate of success than traditional techniques. Pediatric patients have special characteristics that differentiate them from adult patients, so the existing studies and their results should not be extrapolated. Ultrasound has a series of advantages: real-time visualization of our target or infiltration of anatomical plane; a view of the needle performing the puncture; and continuous monitoring of spreading of the local anesthetic. Few techniques satisfy so many requirements for adoption by the medical practice, but trials proving that this is an essential technique for pediatric regional anesthesia are scarce. However, ultrasound has shown to be at least as efficient and as safe as traditional techniques and should therefore be routinely used in pediatric regional anesthesia.     

Is there a role for tumor necrosis factor-alpha inhibitors and especially thalidomide in dermatology?

Because of the relative shortcomings and their side effects of the available anti-inflammatory drugs such as systemic nonsteroids, corticosteroids, and immunosuppressive drugs, and since tumor necrosis factor-a plays a major role in noninfectious inflammatory and autoimmune disorders, tumor necrosis factor-a inhibitory drugs and the available tumor necrosis factor-a inhibitory biologic modifying reagents are described. Among the drugs reviewed are pentoxifylline, thalidomide, etanercept, infliximab, and adalimumab. Their relative effectiveness and side effects are reported and recommendations are made.     

Is there a way to diagnose spinal instability in acute burst fractures by performing ultrasound?

The aim of this study is to examine the predictive value of ultrasound diagnostics for the assessment of traumatic lesions of the posterior ligament complex (PLC) in burst fractures of the thoracolumbar spine. This was a prospective validating cohort study. Judgment about instability and treatment of burst fractures depends on the condition of the PLC. There have been some studies describing underdiagnosis of PLC injuries due to classification problems in ligamentary distraction type fractures. The gold standard for assessing these lesions is magnetic resonance imaging (MRI). Even then, there are often limits in contemporary operational availability and technical limitations of MRI. Ultrasound was described being an alternative. In a prospective study, 54 levels of 18 patients with acute burst fractures of the thoracic and lumbar spine have been examined by ultrasound and additional MRI scans preoperatively. The condition (intact vs. ruptured) of supraspinous ligament (SSL) and the interspinous ligament has been assessed for the ligaments separately. Hematoma below the SSL has also been evaluated as an indirect sign of an injured PLC. In all the patients the primary performed operative treatment was a posterior spinal instrumentation. Postoperatively the blinded results of the ultrasound procedures have been matched against intraoperative and MRI findings. Assessments of all target structures have been contributed to the calculation of the sensitivity and specificity of ultrasound. A total of 18 patients, 14 males and 4 females, with acute burst fractures have been qualified for inclusion in the study. The patients’ mean age was 43.4 years. Comparing intraoperative findings with preoperatively performed investigations, ultrasound archived a sensitivity of 0.99 and a specificity of 0.75 (P < 0.05) to detect traumatic lesions to the PLC. As hypothesized the obtained predictive value using ultrasound correlates closely with intraoperative findings. Anyway MRI still seems to be the superior diagnostic method for examining the PLC. However, ultrasound can be considered to be an adequate alternative method in cases with contraindications for MRI such as ferromagnetic side effects, claustrophobia, availability or emergency diagnostics in multiple injuries.     

Is there a role for bilateral peak systolic velocity readings in a penile duplex ultrasound?

The penile duplex ultrasound (PDU) has been used as a diagnostic tool in erectile dysfunction (ED) management. It is currently recommended that peak systolic velocity (PSV) and end‐diastolic flow (EDF) should be recorded on both the right and left cavernosal arteries. However, the clinical utility of bilateral recordings is unknown. Our primary objective is to assess the clinical utility of bilateral recordings in ED treatment with sildenafil. A total of 77 patients were included. All patients had a standardised PDU and also completed the IIEF‐5 and started on‐demand treatment with sildenafil at 100 mg at baseline. The IIEF‐5 and EDITS were completed at the 6‐month follow‐up. The Spearman test was used to assess correlation. Receiver operating characteristic (ROC) curves were drawn, and the area under the curve (AUC) was calculated. Improvement, cure and satisfaction were high (77.9%, 64.9% and 67.5%, respectively), and the median IIEF‐5 and EDITS were 25(22; 25) and 81.81(63.63; 88.63) respectively. The lowest PSV had the highest positive correlation with IIEF‐5 and EDITS (p = 0.436 and 0.379, respectively), and it could predict improvement, cure and satisfaction with a fair‐to‐good accuracy (AUC = 0.837, 0.750 and 0.749 respectively). The present study shows bilateral penile blood‐flow assessment is important, and attention should be focused on the lowest bilateral PSV.     

Intraoperative tumor localization using laparoscopic ultrasonography in laparoscopic–assisted gastrectomy

Background During laparoscopic-assisted gastrectomy, it is impossible to identify early gastric cancer (EGC) lesions; therefore, a precise localization technique is needed. In this study, we used laparoscopic ultrasonography (LUS) after endoscopic clipping as a method of localizing EGC and evaluated the effectiveness of this method. Methods A prospective study of 17 patients who had undergone laparoscopic—assisted gastrectomy was performed. Three endoscopic clips were applied just proximal to the tumor during the preoperative endoscopy. The applied clips were detected from the serosal side of the stomach using LUS. The serosal surface of the lesion was marked with dye. Results In all patients, endoscopic clips were applied proximal to the lesion without complications, and the applied clips were confirmed by plain abdominal radiography. The clips were successfully detected by LUS in all patients. In the resected specimen, the serosal surface, marked with dye, was always just above the clips in the anterior wall or on the anterior wall opposite the clips applied in the posterior wall. The mean detection time was 4.7 min (range, 2–8). With this procedure, two patients underwent total gastrectomy and 15 patients underwent distal subtotal gastrectomy with gastroduodenostomy or gastrojejunostomy. Histological examination confirmed that the resection margins were tumor free in all patients. There was no operative morbidity related to the LUS procedure. Conclusions Using LUS to detect endoscopic clips is an easy, safe, and accurate method to localize EGC lesions in laparoscopic-assisted gastrectomy. Paper presented at the annual meeting of the Society of American Gastrointestinal Endoscopic Surgeons (SAGES), Denver, Colorado, USA, March–April 2004     

Is there still a role for computed tomography and bone scintigraphy in prostate cancer staging? An analysis from the EUREKA-1 database

Purpose

According to the current guidelines, computed tomography (CT) and bone scintigraphy (BS) are optional in intermediate-risk and recommended in high-risk prostate cancer (PCa). We wonder whether it is time for these examinations to be dismissed, evaluating their staging accuracy in a large cohort of radical prostatectomy (RP) patients.

Methods

To evaluate the ability of CT to predict lymph node involvement (LNI), we included 1091 patients treated with RP and pelvic lymph node dissection, previously staged with abdomino-pelvic CT. As for bone metastases, we included 1145 PCa patients deemed fit for surgery, previously staged with Tc-99m methylene diphosphonate planar BS.

Results

CT scan showed a sensitivity and specificity in predicting LNI of 8.8 and 98 %; subgroup analysis disclosed a significant association only for the high-risk subgroup of 334 patients (P 0.009) with a sensitivity of 11.8 % and positive predictive value (PPV) of 44.4 %. However, logistic multivariate regression analysis including preoperative risk factors excluded any additional predictive ability of CT even in the high-risk group (P 0.40). These data are confirmed by ROC curve analysis, showing a low AUC of 54 % for CT, compared with 69 % for Partin tables and 80 % for Briganti nomogram. BS showed some positivity in 74 cases, only four of whom progressed, while 49 patients with negative BS progressed during their follow-up, six of them immediately after surgery.

Conclusions

According to our opinion, the role of CT and BS should be restricted to selected high-risk patients, while clinical predictive nomograms should be adopted for the surgical planning.

     

Is there enough information about foot care among patients with diabetes?

The United Kingdom has a diabetic population of approximately 1.2 million. It is estimated that approximately 15% of all patients with diabetes will develop a foot ulcer in their lifetime. Twenty-five percent of all patients with foot ulcers will have a major amputation. There have been several publications demonstrating a reduction in foot ulcer and amputation rate through a range of active educational programs and ways of improving patient awareness of the problem. The authors' study attempted to establish the amount of information patients with diabetes have about care of their feet. Of 110 patients recruited, 37 (33%) claimed they had never received any information about foot care. Of those who had received advice, approximately half had received information or had access to information over the previous 10 years. In the majority of cases, information had been given once only. In conclusion, 33% of patients with diabetes did not recall receiving any information about foot care.