Korean J Thorac Cardiovasc Surg.  2009 Oct;42(5):615-623.

Video-Assisted Thoracic Surgery Lobectomy for Non-SmallCell Lung Cancer: Experience of 133 Cases

Affiliations
  • 1Department of Thoracic and Cardiovascular Surgery, Seoul National University Bundang Hospital, Korea. swsung@snubh.org

Abstract

BACKGROUND: We evaluated the feasibility and the efficacy of Video-Assisted Thoracic Surgery (VATS) lobectomy for treating patients with non-small cell lung cancer (NSCLC) and we compared the outcomes of VATS lobectomy with those of open lobectomy. MATERIAL AND METHOD: From 2003 to March 2008, 133 NSCLC patients underwent VATS lobectomy. The patients were selected on the basis of having clinical stage I disease on the chest CT and PET scan. The outcomes of 202 patients who underwent open lobectomy (OL group) for clinical stage I NSCLC were evaluated to compare their results with those of the patients who underwent VATS lobectomy (the VL group). RESULT: The number of females and the number of patients with adenocarcinoma and stage IA disease were greater in VL group (p<0.05). There was no operative mortality or major complications in the VL group. Conversion to thoracotomy was needed in 8 cases (6%), which was mostly due to bleeding. The chest tube indwelling time and the length of the postoperative hospital stay were significantly shorter in the VL group (p<0.001). The number of dissected lymph nodes and the size of tumor were significantly smaller in the VL group (p<0.001). For the pathologic stage I patients, there was no significant difference in the three-year survival rates between the two groups (p=0.15).
CONCLUSION
VATS lobectomy is a safe procedure with low operative mortality and morbidity. VATS lobectomy is feasible for early stage NSCLC and it provides outcomes that are comparable to those for open lobectomy. Further long-term data are needed

Keyword

Video-assisted thoracoscopy; Lobectomy; Carcinoma, non-small cell, lung

MeSH Terms

Adenocarcinoma
Carcinoma, Non-Small-Cell Lung
Chest Tubes
Female
Hemorrhage
Humans
Length of Stay
Lung
Lymph Nodes
Positron-Emission Tomography and Computed Tomography
Survival Rate
Thoracic Surgery, Video-Assisted
Thoracotomy
Thorax
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